Out of Tragedy, Hope
by MagicSwede1965
Summary: Another death in the Enstad family changes two lives.  Follows 'Kane's Caper'.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** _I'm finally back! June has been a busy month for me, primarily due to a cross-country move and the continuing settling-in process. However, I have enough material ready to be able to post two chapters here, and I will complete the story as time permits. Till then, enjoy! Thanks as ever to PDXWiz, jtbwriter, Harry2, Bishop T and Kyryn…_

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§ § § -- December 7, 2003

Christian and Leslie were waiting to board their flight from New York to London, each carrying a small bag; she yawned, then turned to him and peered into the pocket of his shirt while he stared at her in amused surprise. "What are you doing?"

"Making sure we remembered our passports," she said.

"Trust me, my Rose, they're here," Christian assured her, laughing. "If I didn't know better, I'd think being pregnant had affected your brain. I would normally have been the one to repeatedly ask Dr. Lambert if it was really safe for you to travel in your condition, but instead it was you!"

Leslie grinned. "Well, you have to admit, I've never been pregnant before, and you've never dealt with a pregnant woman before—"

"No? What about my sister and my sisters-in-law?" Christian countered.

"Oh, that wasn't the same. They had your brothers and your late brother-in-law to fuss over them. And anyway, after all our attempts and failures, to have a success like this is such a miracle, I don't want to do anything to jeopardize it," said Leslie, glancing ahead of them as the line began to move. "I'm surprised at how well I'm doing. Now that I've finally quit throwing up nearly every day…"

"Now you nap almost as much as my father used to do in the last dozen years of his life," Christian teased her, giving her a quick kiss. "I suppose it's better you're asleep than sick, but believe me, it gets a bit lonely without you to talk to."

Leslie said impishly, "I look at it as storing up for all those sleepless nights we're going to have after the baby's born. Maybe you should think about napping too."

"For different reasons, yes," Christian agreed, highly amused, pausing beside the ticket agent to hand her their boarding passes and passports. "I plan to sleep away as much of this flight as possible."

"Probably very wise, Your Highness," remarked the ticket agent with a grin. "Enjoy your flight, and congratulations on the baby."

"Thank you," Christian and Leslie said together, collected their passports and started down the jetway. Christian wrapped an arm securely around her on the way down and stole another kiss. "I think we set a record," he whispered. "That ticket agent was the only person we met in this entire country who recognized us!"

"Enjoy it now, my love," Leslie advised him, grinning again. "Wait till we land in Sundborg. The press will be all over us."

"Ah, but it's locals," Christian said and shrugged amiably. "I'm not worried about that. Did Mr. Roarke remind you again to call him when we get to the castle?" They would be taking up residence in Christian's old room there; Gerhard and Liselotta no longer had room in their flat for guests, what with two-year-old Matteus and his baby sister Viktoria to deal with. Their trip would last for two weeks, long enough for them to attend the royal Christmas ball that coming Saturday, December 13, and for Christian to spend a few days at his Sundborg office, before they returned to Fantasy Island.

"But of course," Leslie said and laughed. "I think Father has the same fear that you do about pregnancy addling my brain. He reminded me five times to call, from the moment we got to the plane dock Saturday till the last second before we boarded the charter." They were still operating on Fantasy Island time, but reliving Sunday.

Christian chuckled as they caught up with those who had boarded ahead of them. Neither of them would ever forget Roarke's reaction to Leslie's announcement of her pregnancy. He'd slowly risen from his chair behind the desk, his dark eyes alight, his smile very wide. After hugging both Leslie and Christian, he'd said with a very impish chuckle, "I had suspected as much throughout the weekend; I sensed it in you, my child."

"You already knew?" Leslie had exclaimed. "Then why didn't you tell me?"

"Because you wouldn't have believed me," Roarke had said, and both he and Christian had burst into laughter at Leslie's outraged look. From there, the news had spread quickly; Mariki had been delighted, and from that point on had begun plying Leslie with all manner of special dishes that she claimed were passed down through generations of women in her family (and nearly all of which Leslie found too revolting to do more than taste), fussing at her to eat far more often than usual, and generally driving not only Leslie but also Christian more than a little crazy. Even Roarke's admonishments to cease and desist had fallen on deaf ears.

Leslie's friends had cheered at hearing the news; they'd all been aware that Leslie had hoped to have a baby for a long time. Lauren in particular had been thrilled; her baby was due somewhere in February, and she had hopes that the Knights' baby and the Enstads' would become schoolmates and friends. And, to their total shock, Maureen had admitted with some disgruntlement that she too was pregnant and due roughly the same time as Leslie. They'd all stared at her, and Leslie had said, "I thought you and Grady had decided that Brianna was going to be your one and only child."

"So did we," Maureen had said, "but accidents happen." Then she'd snickered and assured them that it was a happy accident. Katsumi had reported that fourteen-year-old Haruko had eagerly offered babysitting services. And when Anna-Kristina and Mateo had heard, they'd been thrilled; Anna-Kristina admitted that she was going to feel much more like an aunt to this baby, even though in fact the child would be her cousin.

Christian and Leslie stashed their bags under the seats in front of them and settled into their own; then he turned to her and regarded her while she frowned down at her seat belt. "Don't pull that too tightly," he said.

Surprised, she looked up and then giggled. "Christian, my love, the baby's not big enough yet to feel constrained by this," she told him, kissing him. "It'll be awhile yet before that happens. Don't worry so much, okay? I'm really fine."

"Or you will be until you have some strange food craving," Christian said with some apprehension. "What happens then?"

"Either the flight attendants can accommodate it, or they can't," said Leslie, "and if they can't, we could always look around in Heathrow and see if we can do something about it then. Really, my darling, it's okay, I promise."

Christian released a soft huff of wry amusement at himself and reached out to smooth her hair. "My darling Rose, I've always worried about you, you know that. Now I'll merely worry all the more. Funny how you seem to know so much for one who's never been pregnant before, hmm?"

"Incorrigible rogue," she said, and he grinned. "Maybe you ought to read a book or something…keep yourself occupied."

"Ach, my darling, you wound me!" he groaned theatrically, and she giggled again. "Is that your way of saying 'shut up and butt out'? Well enough, I can take a hint." Laughing together, they shared one more kiss and settled down for the takeoff.

Leslie was sound asleep when they landed at Heathrow and Christian, sleepy himself, had to shake her with some energy to wake her up. Both a little groggy, they disembarked and were shuttled to the gate where their flight to Sundborg waited. To their astonishment, not only was their plane waiting for them, so was Princess Margareta, who as they found out had been in London for one of her charity causes. Margareta hugged her aunt and uncle, then stepped back and regarded them. "Anna-Kristina claims there's a big secret you two have," she said. "I'd like to hear it."

"You can't stand to wait out a ninety-minute flight so that we can tell the entire family at the same time?" Christian asked with a raised eyebrow.

Margareta rolled her eyes. "Oh, if you insist on waiting, then fine. I simply thought it would be convenient for you to tell me."

"I'm sure you did," Christian said good-naturedly. "Not to worry. The family will find out as soon as we reach the castle. And what of you, how have you been?"

"Busy," the princess said cheerfully as the first boarding call for their flight went out and they got in line to take their first-class seats. "I really enjoy getting out and meeting people and raising awareness for my favorite causes. I think this is what I'm going to focus my life on. I'll be like the first Queen Elizabeth—never married, in charge of her own life, and able to focus on others."

Leslie grinned. "The family bachelorette, I guess!" Margareta laughed and nodded, and they boarded together, though she had a seat a couple of rows back from them so that they couldn't really talk on the flight. It didn't matter much; Leslie fell asleep again, and when they landed in Sundborg, Christian had to wake her up once more.

"You're even worse than my father was," he remarked, shaking his head at her as they started up the jetway. "The frightening part of it is that you're only six weeks along. I hate to think how you'll be as you progress through this pregnancy."

Margareta caught up with them. "What was that?"

"At the castle," Christian said firmly, and she made a face that elicited a grin from him. "Believe me, the news will be worth the wait. Come on."

The rest of the family met them in the great entry of the castle and brought all three travelers back to the dining room, where a meal was about to get under way. After the many greetings and hugs had been exchanged, they all sat down and waited while servants brought out covered dishes and place settings. It soon became clear that seafood was being served, and Leslie swallowed thickly and gave Christian a desperate look. Surprised, he leaned to her and murmured, "I thought you were over that."

"I'm over the throwing up," she clarified. "But not the queasiness around certain foods, unfortunately."

He sighed and then grinned tolerantly. "Is there something you'd prefer to have that you think you can keep down?"

She shrugged. "I'd settle for some fruit."

"What's the secret?" Margareta demanded from across the table and a few seats down, as Gabriella came in and took the seat normally occupied by the reigning monarch. The young queen peered at her aunt and uncle and then at her sister, and the rest of the family focused on Christian and Leslie.

"What secret?" Anna-Laura wanted to know.

"Anna-Kristina e-mailed me from Fantasy Island and said that Uncle Christian and Aunt Leslie have something very big to tell the family. But neither of them would tell me; Uncle Christian insisted on waiting till we were here. Now we are, and I want to know just what's going on." Margareta sat back and folded her arms over her chest. "Come on!"

"I see," said Anna-Laura, studying Leslie. "Leslie, you look a little ill."

Christian looked at Leslie, and she smiled gamely back, nodding at him. He chuckled softly and rested a hand on her back, then took in Carl Johan and Amalia, Anna-Laura, Margareta, Gabriella, Rudolf, Cecilia and Axel with little Princess Elisabeth, and Roald. "Well," he said, "Leslie isn't really ill so much as she is pregnant."

Total silence fell in the room and they all gaped at the two; then everyone exclaimed at once and converged on Christian and Leslie with delighted cries and hugs. Leslie giggled and hugged them all back, radiant; when the family had settled down enough to resume their seats, her pregnancy dominated the dinner conversation for most of the meal. Eventually Cecilia asked curiously, "Do you want to have a boy or a girl?"

"I don't care," said Christian. "Just the fact that I'm to be a father at last…that all by itself overwhelms me. We'll worry about that later on. Tell me, Briella, what are the plans for the Christmas ball? I thought I'd make my usual business trip here around that, so that Leslie could attend one."

"It's to be on Saturday evening, as I mentioned," said Gabriella. "I almost wasn't sure I wanted to hold it, but Aunt Anna-Laura talked me into it. She thought I should start trying to meet new men." Her divorce from Elias had been made final a few months before, but she was still somewhat depressed over it and was having some trouble recovering.

"It's a good idea, and you know it," Anna-Laura assured her. "I know you're still upset about Elias, but it's time for you to move on. The ball will be a perfect venue for you to see and be seen. And as for you—" She turned to Roald. "No sneaking out early, as your Uncle Christian always used to do."

Roald rolled his eyes. "I expect he and Aunt Leslie will sneak out anyway, especially if she finds herself feeling sick during the party. You know I don't like staying so long at those things. There are so many boring people."

"Stay with it, just once," Anna-Laura suggested tartly. "Well, then, Christian, so are you and Leslie using your old room?"

They were, and they retreated here after the meal, now both tired. Gabriella came around shortly after they had both changed into nightwear and asked, "Will you come and sit with the family in the TV room? We've been discussing Mamma."

"How is she, then?" Christian asked.

"The same," said Gabriella with a small shrug. "It's quite strange how she's been in her own world ever since Pappa died. Only Margareta and I visit anymore because she never recognizes anyone, even the two of us. I think she's living in the days when Grandpappa had the throne and everything seemed so grand. You remember all the parties she was always attending with Pappa."

Christian nodded and said wryly, "All too well. So you don't suppose it would be worth it for Leslie and me to go and see her?"

"No," said Gabriella, "she'll never know you're there." She cleared her throat and hung her head, looking far less like the queen she was than an uncertain twenty-nine-year-old divorcee looking for a little advice or reassurance. "I feel as if my entire world is falling apart around me. Pappa dead, Mamma in her own universe, Elias gone…and you and Anna-Kristina living on the other side of the world. It's not the same in here anymore."

"Everything changes, Briella," Christian reminded her gently. "Is the castle a less happy place because some of us no longer live in it?"

"It seems so," said Gabriella softly. "I find myself wishing Gerhard and Liselotta would sell their flat and move back here with Matteus and Viktoria. You started such a strange trend, Uncle Christian, going on your own and having your own business."

Christian sighed a little and slid his arm around Leslie when she drew up beside him. "Prince or no prince, my life is my own," he said. "I'm happy where I am. I spent far too many years trying to remind my father of that, and then your father. Yes, perhaps the family is scattered, but we are still and always family, no matter what. Briella, you and Magga both are stronger than your sister. She still sometimes comes to me for advice, even with Mateo to lean on. I'm beginning to burn out. You're an adult, and moreover, you're the ruler of the country. You're the one who leaped at the chance when Anna-Kristina decided to abdicate the succession. Are you having regrets?"

"No," Gabriella said forcefully. "I intend to reign as long as Great-Grandfather Lukas and Grandpappa and Pappa did, combined. When Matteus is old enough I'll take him in hand and prepare him for the succession myself. I'll see to it that he's a good and just and competent king. No, I only wish that…that we could share more in your lives. I know how private you prefer to keep your life, Uncle Christian. But it seems such a shame that your baby won't be a prince or princess."

"I can't pass down a title I no longer have," Christian pointed out.

"Of course not," said Gabriella. "But I've been thinking about changing that law. It's not one of the unassailable ones, you know—there are only a few of those. Lilla Jordsö is the only country in the world that strips a royal of the title if they leave the country. It doesn't seem very fair to me to do that. Parliament is still arguing about revoking Anna-Kristina's title, and it's been such a big issue that I'm seriously considering stepping in and amending things to end this foolishness once and for all. So, if I could get you your title back, would you take it?"

Christian gaped at her, then looked at Leslie, who smiled. "It's entirely up to you, my love," she said. "But you might keep in mind that you've been a commoner only a couple of years and still haven't totally adjusted to it. Just because you're a prince, that doesn't mean you can't still keep your life private."

"Do people still call him 'Prince Christian' and so on?" Gabriella asked her.

Leslie nodded and said, "All the time. Father's cook has never called him anything but 'Prince Christian', and most of our guests who happen to meet him still address him as 'Your Highness'. And he still has that royal soul—he'll never be able to shake it. Maybe he's officially a commoner, but as several people have pointed out, once a prince, always a prince. My only qualm about it is that I'd be a princess again, and I don't know if I could handle that. I really don't think I'd ever get used to being called 'Your Highness'."

They all laughed and Christian squeezed Leslie. "Well, you keep thinking about it, Briella," he said. "It's your decision, of course, as queen. I just wonder why the parliament is having such a hard time with it. Perhaps there's something in the law itself about revoking a title more than once in a given period."

Gabriella said, "That crossed my mind too. Anyway, it's not an attempt to make you come back here…"

Christian grinned. "That might well have been my next question. Oh, don't worry, we'll see to it that you and the others know your new cousin and that he or she knows all of you. And give yourself a chance to meet men at the ball. I daresay you'd have more success finding someone there than I ever did."

"Maybe this time you'll stay till the end of the party," Gabriella said mischievously.

"Not if your aunt falls asleep in the middle of it all," Christian retorted with a wicked look at Leslie. "She's napping worse than your grandfather did in his declining years."

"Rogue," said Leslie and grinned. "Well, if we're going to sit with the family, let's go."


	2. Chapter 2

§ § § -- December 13, 2003

Christian was clad in his white dress uniform and Leslie wore a long sky-blue gown with an iridescent shimmer in the fabric, another of the half-dozen items she'd acquired two years before when she and Christian had come for what turned out to be Arnulf's funeral and Gabriella's coronation. It was the first opportunity she'd had to wear this dress, and Christian marveled at her when she modeled it for him. "Oh, my Rose, you'll do me so proud tonight," he said softly, coming to her and gathering her in close. "I have many days yet when I can still barely believe you're truly my wife."

"Every day with you is still a dream come true for me," Leslie told him, nestling against him and tucking her head under his chin. She squeezed him, then lifted her head and regarded him with a little grin. "But judging from the national reaction to the news that I'm pregnant, something tells me that you're going to see an entire Christmas ball from start to finish, for the first time in your life."

Christian laughed and nodded ruefully. "I suspect you're right, my darling. It'll take that long for all the guests to come up and comment on it. It seems the people are so used to my having been a lone wolf for so many years, and even more so to my having been childless, that they look at it as some sort of miracle. As a matter of fact, I see it that way myself." He smiled at her and drew her in closer. "However, there may be one excellent excuse for leaving early as I always had done before: your tendency towards sleepiness!"

"Or queasiness, depending on what's in the buffet," Leslie bantered, getting another chuckle from her husband. "I think I'm ready, how about you?"

"As ready as I can ever be to face the public," Christian said through a gentle sigh. "Let's go, then." They linked arms and left the suite, already hearing the noise of arriving guests in the great entry, and looked at each other with wry grins before making their way down to Anna-Laura's suite. She got a good look at them and shook her head.

"You two are going to draw in every person at the ball," she said.

"How do you figure that?" Christian asked.

"The way you look. Leslie's glowing—I know that's a ridiculous cliché, but she is; and you have a look about you that I've seen only once before—the day you married her. The two of you are so delighted about becoming parents, it shows. And you know the people are thrilled beyond belief that you, the happy prince, are finally going to be a father."

"You ought to see the cards and the letters that have been pouring in since the official announcement the morning after you arrived," said a new voice. They looked around to see Carl Johan and Amalia coming into the suite with Rudolf; it was Carl Johan who had spoken. "Your business will be closed tomorrow, Christian, so there's no reason you and Leslie can't take some time to look over some of them. Incidentally, did you ever update the family website? I haven't had a chance to look at it yet."

"I did that from the Sundborg office," Christian said. "That was the afternoon of the day we had that press conference announcing Leslie's pregnancy, and after I updated our page, I had to take care of some glitches in a few other sites. When I finished that I took a look at the update and discovered nearly ten thousand hits to the site in just the short time since I made the changes."

Carl Johan grinned and the women looked at one another in amazement. "You're obviously still the favorite among the people, for all that you've run off to the other side of the world," Carl Johan noted.

"So it seems," Anna-Laura concurred. "Oh, Christian Carl Tobias, don't give me that look! You've never fully appreciated how handsome you truly are; and more than that, you don't seem to realize that you're generally considered the most approachable of anyone in the family. We're all well in the people's good graces, but you more than anyone else. Just accept it, and stop looking as if it's the bane of your existence."

Leslie turned to him and kissed his cheek. "You'll just have to play the role of the People's Prince for the evening, my love," she said lightly. "Besides, think of it like this. It's a lot better than having everyone hate you and think you're a worthless cad."

"You're really no help at all," Christian accused her, though he was laughing along with everyone else. "Look, if we're going to this thing, let's get it done already."

The royal family made a collective entrance from the west corridor, complete with fanfare; Gabriella, as queen, led the others out, and as she passed by on her way to the throne set on the dais, everyone bowed or curtsied. This was repeated for the rest of the family as they followed her; when Christian and Leslie emerged, people began breaking into applause and even cheering. Leslie felt her face go hot, and she sensed more than heard Christian's soft groan of resignation. But he hid his mild exasperation and graciously acknowledged the congratulations; Leslie tried to follow his lead, though she felt distinctly out of place.

Christian noticed and huddled her close on the dais. "Do you want me to tell Briella to forget about trying to change the law regarding title revocation?" he teased her.

Leslie had to laugh, and hugged him back. "I don't think it makes any difference," she admitted with good grace. "You're officially a commoner and you still get all this attention and adoration, so whatever she ultimately decides to do isn't going to change anything."

"Quite true," Christian agreed cheerfully. "All right, then, let me know when you're ready to dance. I'll gladly spend the entire evening on the floor with you, my darling, as long as you feel up to it. And tell me if you get hungry, I'll take care of it for you."

The first three hours passed in a whirlwind of Christmas greetings, congratulations, dances of all sorts, and endless introductions and well-wishing between Christian on both his and Leslie's behalf and guest after guest after guest. Then came time for _violsdansen_, the traditional halfway point of the royal Christmas ball, and Christian hesitated while the rest of the family streamed off the dais. "I know you don't know this dance," he said. "If you want me to stay here with you, I will."

Leslie could see in his face that he really wanted to participate in this dance more than any other, and smiled at him. She knew enough of her husband's history that she was aware that he thought of this as a private tribute to his mother's memory. "Go on, my love," she assured him. "I don't want you to miss out on this just on account of me. I'll sit up here and watch. And then later on you're going to teach me how to do it."

Christian smiled back, his eyes warming. "Leslie, my light, if you only realized just how undeservedly lucky I feel to have you. I'll come right back when it ends." He kissed her softly, then jogged down off the dais in the others' wake. Leslie watched him go, thinking to herself, _I wonder if he knows I feel exactly the same way about him! Whatever it was about me that made him fall in love with me, I'm glad it happened._ Christian's was a rarefied world, and she wasn't sure she would ever truly feel comfortable within it, much less fit in; but she felt privileged to have these frequent glimpses into the life of a royal, and looked on with wide-eyed fascination while _violsdansen_ progressed. It was a fairly intricate dance, but elegant in a sort of quaint way; and its participants clearly were having a wonderful time performing it. The music, of course, was Asplundh's _Melodin till violsdansen_, which tradition Christian had once informed Leslie with playful smugness had been at his own urging.

Christian returned as promised when the dance ended, settling down beside Leslie and wrapping an arm securely around her shoulders. "What do you think of it? Do you think you'll be able to learn all those steps?"

"I don't know, but I can sure give it a try," she said, and they laughed and leaned into each other. "You know, I could do with some fruit right about now. It's really weird, fruit's about the only thing my stomach will put up with lately."

Christian chuckled. "At least it's not junk food. Don't get up, I'll handle it."

Despite everything, they did indeed leave the ball early; Leslie's drowsiness was gaining on her, becoming more than she could fight. Christian was clearly more than happy to have a good excuse to call it quits. Their progress back to the west-corridor entrance was excruciatingly slow, though, since people had to tender their congratulations and best wishes again all the way there. Within a few feet of the corridor, the head of parliament got hold of Christian and began to talk excitedly to him in rapid _jordiska_; Christian had little choice but to pause and indulge the man. Leslie watched her husband as he was drawn into the topic, apparently despite himself, and started to fully participate in the conversation. She tried to be patient, but the idea of crawling into a warm cozy bed and relaxing into sleep was so tempting that she just couldn't stifle an enormous yawn. The head of parliament didn't see her at all; even Christian barely noticed, absently sliding an arm around her. _Oh, fine,_ Leslie thought with sleepy amusement, and leaned into him, resting her head on his shoulder and closing her eyes. To her brain it was a signal, and she slid rapidly out of consciousness, relaxing heavily against Christian.

For his part, Christian was vaguely annoyed to begin with; but then the head of parliament brought up the ongoing debate over the revocation of Anna-Kristina's title, and Christian couldn't help mentioning Gabriella's idea about changing the law. The two were volleying rapidly back and forth on the subject when Christian became aware of a deadweight against him, slowly sliding, and turned to his wife in time to realize she'd actually fallen asleep standing up and was gradually sinking to the floor. Blurting a startled _jordisk_ exclamation, he hurriedly gathered her up and lifted her into his arms, casting the head of parliament an apologetic look. "You'll have to excuse my wife," he said. "She seems to have entered the sleeping phase of pregnancy several months before she's supposed to."

The head of parliament laughed. "My fault, Your Highness," he said. "If you have some time to spare later this week, I should prefer to discuss this not just with you, but with Her Majesty and Prince Carl Johan and Princess Anna-Laura as well."

"I'll make the suggestion and see if we can arrange something," Christian promised. "At the moment I'm afraid we really must get away. Thank you again for your kind wishes." The head of parliament bowed, and Christian nodded acknowledgement and carried Leslie away into the corridor, relieved to escape the ball at last.

On the stairs he sat down, cradled Leslie close and smiled, very amused. "All right, my Rose, enough is enough," he said teasingly to her. "Wake up now." He jostled her gently, and she stirred and sighed, then relaxed again. Laughing, Christian shook her a little harder, until she opened her eyes and peered at him warily.

"Don't tell me I actually fell asleep," she said.

"You did," Christian assured her, his laughter ringing across the corridor. "Oh, Leslie, my darling, what am I to do with you? Two months pregnant and you act as if you're three times that far along! When is your next checkup with Dr. Lambert?"

"The day after Christmas," she said. She grinned at him suddenly. "Hey, don't be so quick to complain. It got you away from the head of parliament, didn't it?"

Christian threw back his head and roared with mirth. "I admit, you're right about that!" he conceded through his laughter. He hugged her close and buried his face in her hair, taking a deep breath and smiling. "Ah, my sweet, priceless wife. Let's get back to our room and some measure of peace, and you can sleep all you like. Tomorrow we'll be reading cards and letters, and I'm sure you won't want to miss out on that."

"And heck knows I'll need all my energy to open all those envelopes," Leslie cracked, getting yet another laugh from him. "Okay, let's go."

Back in Christian's old room, they slowly got out of their formal clothing and into their usual sleepwear, then took turns brushing their teeth. Once in bed, Christian propped himself up on one elbow and studied Leslie while she yawned and snuggled sleepily into her pillow. "Leslie," he said softly, "tell me, are you quite sure you feel all right?"

She blinked drowsily up at him and smiled. "I feel fine," she assured him. "Please, my love, don't spend so much energy worrying about me. Dr. Lambert said I'm doing great, and that as long as I keep up with those vitamins she gave me, I shouldn't have any trouble."

"Those ridiculous elephant pills?" Christian asked, eyes wide. "But you can't swallow those, my Rose, didn't you tell her that?"

"Dr. Lambert knows all my eccentricities, my darling," Leslie said. "They're in liquid form. The pharmacist in town tried to give it a cherry flavor, but my taste buds seem to interpret it as a cross between cherry-tree bark and cherry pits. Anyway, I've tasted worse. Please, Christian, my love, go to sleep, okay? I'm pregnant, not mortally ill."

Christian rolled aside long enough to douse the lamp, then lay down beside her and kissed her forehead through her bangs. "I've always worried about you, my precious Rose, and I worry all the more with you in this condition. You know it's only because I love you so deeply. Bear with me, please."

Leslie gently tugged him closer and kissed him, sifting his hair through her fingers, hearing his soft sigh and faint moan. Something stirred within her and she aligned her body to his, exploring his chest with one hand. Christian lifted his head from hers and asked in a husky voice, "Are you sure?"

"Yes," Leslie said and smiled. "I promise not to fall asleep on you, my love."

Christian chuckled. "I'll hold you to that," he murmured and kissed her, sliding his hand under her nightshift. They made slow, leisurely love, warming themselves against the chill in the room. Afterward Leslie fell asleep on Christian's shoulder, and he reached down with his free hand and slowly, tentatively, caressed her lower abdomen where he knew their son or daughter was growing. _Be safe in there, and be careful of your mother,_ he thought, _for I love her more than anything else in the entire world._ He swallowed back a surge of emotion and finally drifted off to sleep.

§ § § -- December 15, 2003

The family had finished lunch about an hour before, and outside it had begun to snow, delighting Leslie, who insisted on sitting in the generous window seat in the sitting room to watch it fall. Her in-laws were amused. "You like snow?" Carl Johan asked.

Christian laughed. "Leslie was born in a place that often gets snow in winter," he explained, "and she still misses it, especially around Christmas. I think it's been quite a few years since she last saw it. As much as she loves Fantasy Island, there are some things she'll never stop yearning for."

"He's right," Leslie said, grinning. "I do miss the snow, but only at Christmas really. Father used to tease me about sending me to Alaska every December so I'd stop complaining. Maybe I'll get an invitation to the North Pole one of these days."

"Don't ask," Christian said, seeing the expression on his brother's face. "Where did Axel and Cecilia go, anyway? They were aware of the forecast, weren't they?"

"As far as I know," said Carl Johan.

"Ceci promised she and Axel would return before it got too bad," Anna-Laura said, casting a glance out the window past Leslie. She was holding seven-month-old Elisabeth, gently jouncing the baby, who was giggling happily. "They should be on their way home at this moment, in fact. They went into the city for some Christmas shopping."

Carl Johan went to the television set and turned it on, flipping rapidly through channels until he found a satellite-delivered all-news channel. "They should have a forecast eventually," he said. "Christian, sit down. If you spend Leslie's entire pregnancy hovering over her as you're doing now, she'll be demanding a divorce by the time that baby is born. I learned that somewhat the hard way when Amalia was pregnant with Gerhard."

"Come to think of it," Christian recalled with a grin, "I do remember quite a few loud complaints from Amalia…threats to call off the wedding and run away with Gerhard after his birth, if I'm not mistaken."

"You're not," Amalia said, laughing. "Don't do as your brother did, please. You spent too long looking for Leslie, and we would truly hate to see you lose her."

Leslie laughed and pulled Christian close by her side. "Oh, he's got nothing to worry about there. I can tolerate Christian's hovering. At least he's not like my father's cook, shoving a plate of food in my face every half hour. She's always pushed me to eat more than I do, but now that I'm pregnant she's tripled her efforts."

"Is that the same Polynesian lady we met when we came for your wedding?" asked Carl Johan. At Leslie's nod, he remarked, "I was tempted to eat far more than I did. She has a true way with food. Perhaps, Amalia, you and I should make a trip to the island again just before Leslie is due to give birth, and we'll have an excuse to take dinner at Mr. Roarke's home. The cuisine is exotic to me, but irresistible."

"We get leftovers," Leslie said, grinning. "You could as easily stay with us and eat just as well." They all laughed.

"Where would they sleep?" Anna-Laura asked, chuckling. "I've seen the photos of your house that you sent, Christian, and you have exactly one bedroom. Where are you planning to put the baby?"

"We're having an addition built," Christian said. "Construction has already begun, in fact. I deliberately designed the house so that it would accommodate just such an event, and toward the end we may have to take a bungalow or move in temporarily with Mr. Roarke, so that the construction noise and dust don't bother us or give Leslie any health trouble."

"A wise idea," said Anna-Laura with a nod. Just then the door opened and Gerhard and Liselotta came in; she was carrying Viktoria, while Gerhard led two-year-old Matteus by the hand. Rudolf was just behind them. For a few minutes Carl Johan and Amalia fussed over their grandchildren, while Gerhard and Liselotta asked Christian and Leslie about their baby-to-be and offered a few suggestions for names which made the expectant couple laugh finally and admit that they hadn't yet reached the point where they'd started considering that. Christian was updating them on Mateo and Anna-Kristina's wait for the adoption of a baby girl from China when the castle secretary appeared in the doorway, looking shaken. Leslie saw her first and stood up from the window seat, turning to Christian.

"My love," she said softly, "I think someone needs to speak to us…"

Christian looked around and recognized the secretary, who had been with the family since early 1996, shortly after Arnulf had taken the throne. "Oh, I see," he murmured and raised his voice. "Everyone…it seems the secretary has news. And it doesn't look good."

"It's not good at all, Your Highness," the secretary said in adequate, though heavily accented, English. "I wish with my whole heart that it were not I who must deliver this terrible news. But the police have arrived and they are waiting in the great entry. There has been an accident…Princess Anna-Laura, they have asked to see you."

Anna-Laura turned pale. "They are there now?" she asked blankly.

The secretary nodded and requested, "If you would come with me, Your Highness."

"We'll all come," Carl Johan said, meeting Christian's gaze for a moment; Christian nodded, sliding his arm around Leslie. The family, solemn and apprehensive, filed out of the sitting room in the secretary's wake and down the east corridor to the great entry, where two policemen waited. Both bowed when the royal family emerged from the corridor, then focused on Anna-Laura, who still held her baby granddaughter; and the older of the two spoke quietly in _jordiska_, his voice sounding strained.

Anna-Laura stared and stared at him; the rest of the family gasped, and Leslie felt an icicle spear through her. She turned to Christian, who swallowed thickly, leaned to her and whispered, "It's Axel and Cecilia. Another car hit them at high speed on the coastal road coming back here. They…they were both killed instantly."

"Oh my God," Leslie whispered. Christian closed his eyes, and she turned fully into him, hugging him hard. He held her just as tightly. For a long moment there was a horrible silence in the great entry; then Anna-Laura let out an anguished, keening wail that echoed eerily off the stone roof three stories above, and both Christian and Leslie flinched at the sound. She looked cautiously around them and noticed that Carl Johan and Amalia were clutching each other just as she and Christian were doing; Gerhard and Liselotta were cradling their children, she shedding tears and he looking shocked. Rudolf's expression mirrored his older brother's. And Anna-Laura stood alone, clutching the baby, her face a terrifying mask of grief, her voice rising in pitch and volume as she cried.

Leslie felt Christian draw in a deep breath and straighten, as if bracing himself; then he turned to the secretary and issued some instructions in _jordiska_. The woman nodded and fled away down the east corridor. Focusing on Leslie again, he murmured, "I told her to go and find Margareta and Gabriella, and especially Roald. We…I…we should see to Anna-Laura." He swallowed hard again and breathed in deeply, resting his head against hers for a second or two, then kissing her cheek and adding, "Thank the fates that I have you. I don't know who's going to comfort my sister."

"We'll all do it," Leslie said softly. "She needs all of us."

Christian nodded, and they moved toward Anna-Laura, who seemed unaware of her surroundings any longer. Carl Johan had managed to gather himself enough to speak with the policemen, they saw; Amalia stood with her fist pressed against her mouth and her eyes closed. Christian and Leslie could see it would be up to them to offer the first comfort.

The baby was wailing in response to her grandmother's keening, and Leslie gently lifted the little girl from Anna-Laura's arms and cuddled her close, rocking her soothingly. She watched with stinging eyes while Christian pulled his sister into his arms and stood just holding her, letting her expel her grief; he caught Leslie's eye, and she saw tears standing in his. That was all it took to make her own eyes overflow.


	3. Chapter 3

§ § § -- December 18, 2003

The three children, snugly bundled into strollers, slept in the heavily overcast winter afternoon. Roald had charge of his orphaned little niece, though he seemed almost unaware of it, staring into space. Gerhard and Liselotta stood nearby, guarding their own two; Rudolf, Margareta and Gabriella huddled not far away. Carl Johan and Christian, each with his wife at his side, flanked their sister, whose gaze was fixed on her daughter's coffin, just being lowered into the ground. Axel's coffin waited its turn.

Leslie shivered in the frigid breeze, blinking as the occasional snowflake batted her in the face, and wondered what they were going to do now. Christian had related his memory of the day Anna-Laura's husband, Esbjörn Lagnebring, had been buried, telling her how she had strained to go to the coffin and how Arnulf I and Susanna had had to exert nearly all their strength to restrain her. It was the reason he and Carl Johan now stood one on either side of Anna-Laura, ready to hold onto her in case she reacted the same way; but so far she simply stood in silence, her face pale and her eyes blank.

_A week before Christmas,_ Leslie thought. _It's going to be hell on poor Anna-Laura, and I have to wonder what Roald's thinking. I wonder if we couldn't do something for them, especially Anna-Laura…she lost her husband all those years ago, and now she's lost her daughter and son-in-law. All she has now are Roald and the baby. And Roald's behavior since Christian and I got here hasn't been a very good omen._ Roald, 23, was a carefree young devil, with several very wealthy friends who liked to skirt the edge of the law; he spent far more time away from the castle than in it, and when he was there he took little interest in family affairs. After his sister and brother-in-law had been killed, the family had seen nothing at all of him until the police had brought him back to the castle just the previous evening, heavily drunk and mumbling constantly in _jordiska_. His silence now was largely the result of a killing hangover, but sorrow glimmered in his eyes too; even from where she stood beside Christian, she could see it.

Anna-Laura's desperate wail rose into the sky, and Leslie turned back just in time to see Christian and Carl Johan each take one of her arms and hold on. Sure enough, she was struggling towards Cecilia's new grave, fighting so hard to go that Carl Johan and Christian had to plant their feet well apart and brace themselves with all their strength. Amalia and Leslie looked at each other past their husbands and sister-in-law; Amalia's gaze showed she was as worried as Leslie. Anna-Laura's voice rose into a shriek. _"Min lilla, min flicka, ta inte henne…nej, jag vill dö…"_

"_Det ska du inte,"_ Christian snapped low in response, and glanced at Leslie. "She claims to want to die. She's too strong for that, but losing a child…"

"We…she needs to get away," Leslie said. "What if we—" She had no chance to finish the thought, for just then Anna-Laura broke away from her brothers and lurched to the gravesite. Instantly Carl Johan and Christian, as well as Amalia and Leslie, lunged after her, all four pulling her to a halt and combining their strength to hold her in place. Carl Johan spoke urgently to her in _jordiska_, and finally she wilted in their grasp and began to sob.

The rest of the service was an ordeal; the only sounds were Anna-Laura's soft sobbing and the drone of the pastor conducting the funeral. The grieving princess stood lax and unresisting, allowing her brothers to release her; Christian took his sister's hand and interlaced the fingers of his other hand with Leslie's. On Anna-Laura's other side, Carl Johan followed suit, with his sister's hand in one of his and his wife's in the other; all five stood huddled close together for both comfort and warmth. Leslie, Christian, Carl Johan and Amalia watched bleakly while Cecilia's grave was filled in and Axel's casket was lowered into its grave directly beside hers. Axel's family—his parents, a brother and a sister-in-law—stood on the far side of the two graves, as though they and the royal family were divided into two opposing camps. Leslie glanced at them and wondered how close Axel's parents were to little Princess Elisabeth. For that matter, it made her wonder about Amalia's, Kristina's and Esbjörn's families and what sort of relationship they'd had with their royal relatives, and whether Christian had ever known or even met anyone on his mother's side of the family.

No one said much after the funeral, keeping their heads down as they passed the TV cameras that had been there to broadcast the service around the country. Anna-Laura, Roald and baby Elisabeth were whisked away in one car; Carl Johan, Amalia, Christian and Leslie had another, and Gabriella, Margareta, Gerhard, Liselotta, Matteus and Viktoria rode in a third. Despite being queen, Gabriella usually preferred not to play up her status unless it was unavoidable.

"How often did Axel's family see the baby?" Leslie ventured on the way back to the castle. Christian shrugged; Carl Johan and Amalia looked up.

"It's too often the way of _jordiska_ royals that the non-royal relatives rarely really know the children," Carl Johan said through a long sigh. "Even now this holds true. If a commoner marries into the royal family, the ones left behind seldom, if ever, see that person again, and usually barely have the opportunity to meet the children of the union. The only exception that I can recall was Esbjörn's family, until he was killed. After that they retreated, and Ceci and Roald grew up without knowing their father's family except from afar."

Amalia nodded, looking pensive. "It's very true," she admitted. "My parents hardly know Gerhard and Rudolf, and have never met my grandchildren. It was the same for Kristina's parents and siblings in the case of Anna-Kristina, Briella and Magga."

"You'll be an exception in reverse, I think," observed Carl Johan. "Leslie, your father will know your baby far better than we will."

"We'll try not to let that happen," said Christian. "I know Mr. Roarke is greatly looking forward to welcoming grandchildren, but he himself advised that our son or daughter should be as well acquainted with all of you as with him. And if it means frequent trips back and forth from one side of the planet to the other, then so be it." He frowned. "I was never able to get in touch with Anna-Kristina to let her know about Ceci. I don't know what happened to her and Mateo, do you, Leslie?"

"I think Anna-Kristina sent an e-mail about an interview they had to do with some officials from China who were going to be on the island this week," she said. "But that shouldn't have prevented her from hearing about this."

"We can telephone her this evening," said Carl Johan. "Perhaps it was necessary for them to leave the island for this interview. Once Ceci got old enough to become interested in clothes, she and Anna-Kristina grew fairly close. It'll be a blow to her."

Christian, Leslie and Amalia nodded solemnly, and they all dropped back into silence after that. Near the castle Christian finally murmured to Leslie, "How are you feeling, my Rose? Everything all right?"

"No problems," Leslie assured him. She nestled against him and smiled slightly when he wrapped an arm around her. She lost herself in thought, and by the time they arrived at the castle the idea she'd had at the funeral had come back to mind. She tucked it away for the moment, but made a resolution to bring it up as soon as she could.

They found Anna-Laura in the sitting room, holding the sleeping baby, her face slack and her demeanor faraway, an odd look in her eyes. Carl Johan and Christian looked at each other, and Carl Johan asked, "Where's Roald?"

"He left," said Anna-Laura dispiritedly.

"He's gone out of control," Carl Johan said, shaking his head. "He was wild enough before this, but with Ceci gone now, he's impossible. Something needs to be done."

"He's grieving," Anna-Laura snapped at her older brother, glaring. "Let him be!"

"Not like this, _äldresyster,"_ Christian said gently. "I don't like to be so blunt, but I have to tell you that if you allow him to run completely unchecked, he could meet as tragic an end as Ceci and Axel did. He's too old to continue on as he is, Anna-Laura."

She turned her glare on him. "How ironic that this comes from you!"

Christian shot the ceiling an exasperated look, but before either he or Carl Johan could say anything more, Leslie sat beside Anna-Laura and laid a hand on her sister-in-law's shoulder. "I had an idea," she said softly, making Anna-Laura turn to stare at her with that same strange, spooky look in her eyes. "I think you need to get away from here. This whole place is full of memories and you need to put some distance between yourself and the castle. Tell me, how long has it been since you took a trip just for the sake of traveling?"

"I don't know," Anna-Laura muttered listlessly.

"Then why don't you come back to Fantasy Island with Christian and me?" Leslie offered. "Bring the baby and Roald—I think Roald should definitely come too."

Carl Johan and Amalia exchanged surprised glances, then both nodded firmly. "That's an excellent idea," said Carl Johan. "You do need to get away, Anna-Laura. You haven't left the country in far too long. Take the trip back with Christian and Leslie, and we'll help you get the baby ready to go. And if we have to have Roald arrested and then locked in his rooms till it's time to leave, we will. Briella can even issue a royal edict if necessary, but I think the trip will do him as much good as it will you."

"I think she's right," Christian said. "We leave Saturday; if we start now and pull a few strings, I think perhaps we can get you and Roald and Elisabeth on either the same flights we're on, or ones that will arrive close to the time ours do. But you do need to get away from here, or you'll slowly drown in your grief. I still remember how long you hid after Esbjörn died. Since Elisabeth is your responsibility now, you can't retreat like that this time around. It'll do you good to have a change of locale."

"It's strange," murmured Anna-Laura distantly, looking at Leslie with a touch of entreaty in her eyes. "But I've been taking some comfort in believing that Ceci must be at last getting to know her father, as she was never able to do in life."

Leslie compressed her lips and nodded, her eyes welling up in the empathy that she knew Christian could sense even without looking at him. "That's a beautiful way to think of it, Anna-Laura," she said softly. "It would be so right for that to happen."

Anna-Laura smiled ever so faintly, and she reached around to hug Leslie with one arm. "Thank the fates that Christian found you," she said in a tattered little voice. "You understand what death brings to a person. Yes, I think you're right…Lisi and Roald and I will return to Fantasy Island with you and Christian."

§ § § -- December 20, 2003

"I still can't believe you're making me do this," Roald fumed, waiting with his mother, niece, aunt and uncle at Sundborg's airport. "I'm more than old enough to make up my own mind about what to do and when to do it. I don't particularly care to go away anywhere, especially so close to Christmas."

"Well, you're going," Christian said coldly, his tone the result of his weariness with the ongoing head-butting he'd been experiencing with his nephew. "You've had entirely too free a hand lately and you've been getting into far too much trouble. You're too old to keep playing stupid games with your life, Roald."

Roald glared at him. "You're a hell of a one to talk! You raised enough of your own hell in your day. I still remember the way you deliberately shocked Grandpappa by dating Astrid Franzén…and you were eight years older then than I am now! You were always defying Grandpappa and Uncle Arnulf! I thought you were the coolest member of the whole family back then. Now you've turned into as much of a prude as Mother and Uncle Carl Johan and Aunt Amalia. Why don't you just leave me alone!"

"That's enough from you," Anna-Laura warned her son, but Roald only rolled his eyes and slouched against a pillar supporting the ceiling. Christian growled low in his throat and turned away from Roald, shaking his head disgustedly.

"He's the next generation's hellion, I guess," Leslie murmured to her husband, amused by Roald's recalcitrance and Christian's annoyance. "Once we get going he'll settle down."

Christian gave her a wry look. "The worst of it is, he has a point and he knows it," he said ruefully. "I had many hellion-type moments during my twenties, and it culminated in my squiring Astrid Franzén around purely for the shock value. I did a few daredevil things in my time, and he's more than old enough to remember most of that."

Leslie smiled and kissed him gently. "But the police never brought you home drunk," she pointed out, "and you never rebelled merely for its own sake—your rebellion was the result of your father's and Arnulf's constant attempts at control. Sure, you bucked tradition, but you've always had a practical, sensible streak in you. It's not really the same, and I think Roald knows that but just hates the idea of admitting to it."

"I suppose that's true," said Christian and grinned. "In any case, I have a feeling it's going to be a very long trip. I envy you, as much as you sleep. Do you suppose the flight attendants will have any tranquilizers I can make use of?" They both laughed and hugged each other briefly.

Roald was imperious and demanding all the way to Fantasy Island; due to the long flights, unexpectedly lengthy layovers and the crossing of the International Date Line, it was Monday before they stepped onto terra firma at the plane dock. Anna-Laura immediately set about removing some of baby Elisabeth's extra layers of clothing. _"Herregud_, but it's hot here!" she exclaimed. "I can never seem to remember that this is a tropical island. You must simply have been freezing in Lilla Jordsö, Leslie…perhaps even you as well, Christian, since I expect you've long since readjusted to the climate here."

"It was refreshing for a change, to have some really cold weather," Christian said with a shrug. "I must admit, though, it's hard to believe it's three days before Christmas."

"I want my own bungalow," Roald said snippily, glaring at his mother and his uncle by turns and then eyeing Leslie with just as little warmth. "You'll speak to Mr. Roarke about it, of course."

Leslie studied him for a moment, then said, "Frankly, I don't think you deserve it, even if we had any bungalows available just to suit your need to assert your royal status. Count yourself lucky you're in a bungalow at all and resign yourself to sharing with your mother and your niece."

Christian snickered, and Anna-Laura nodded sharply. "Exactly so," she said to Roald. "Stop this behavior immediately, Roald Helmer Olaf Lagnebring. If you don't know how to be polite, then for fate's sake hold your tongue."

A car pulled up just then and Roarke got out, with Anna-Kristina and Mateo climbing out of the passenger seats. Anna-Kristina rushed up to Anna-Laura and the two hugged each other; the younger woman had already begun to cry. "We heard only yesterday," she sobbed. "I wish we had been able to have our latest adoption interview here on the island, but the officials wanted us to meet them in Taiwan and we had to go there. Oh, it's terrible." Anna-Laura squeezed her eyes shut and murmured something in _jordiska_, but otherwise couldn't respond; she just clung to her niece.

Roald snorted and turned to Roarke, who had just caught up with them. "Aunt Leslie tells me I'm sharing a bungalow with Mother and the baby," he said. "I'd prefer my own."

"I apologize, Your Highness, but we had only the one free bungalow," Roarke said with a smile and a shallow bow. "However, it has two bedrooms, so you will have a measure of privacy. Your Highness…" He turned to Anna-Laura, who looked at him over Anna-Kristina's shoulder, her eyes swimming in tears. "I am so very sorry for the loss of your daughter and your son-in-law. Please know that if there is anything at all that I personally, or any of my staff, can do for you, you need only say so and it will be done immediately."

"I thank you, Mr. Roarke," Anna-Laura said shakily. "Just at the moment I think the best thing for us is to rest after all those long flights."

"Of course," Roarke agreed. "We'll take you to your bungalow immediately." He then approached Christian and Leslie, shook hands with the former and hugged the latter. "Are you feeling all right, Leslie?"

"Perfectly fine, Father," she said and lowered her voice. "I slept most of the flights away, but Christian told me Roald gave the flight attendants headaches demanding this, that and the other."

"He's going to be extremely difficult, Mr. Roarke," Christian agreed with a glance at Roald, who had wandered aside toward the car, looking bored and impatient. "I don't even know if he's really grieved for his sister yet. If so, he's expressing it in a very unsavory way. If he causes trouble, by all means do what you must to put him back in line. Anna-Laura would urge the same, so don't feel you must defer to him because he's a prince."

Roarke smiled. "Thank you, Christian. I expect you two are quite tired also, but if you're feeling equal to it, you might like to join me for dinner. I'll have Princess Anna-Laura over if she wishes, and Prince Roald is also welcome."

"Roald will probably turn you down, but Anna-Laura will be glad to have that worry taken care of," Christian said. "I think we'll be there too. If you'll give us a chance to go home and change clothes and rest a bit, we'll return to the main house about five-thirty."

"That's fine," Roarke said. "Your car is still at the main house. Why don't we go."

Christian and Leslie nodded, and she yawned while he put an arm around her waist and asked Mateo a few questions about the business. Everyone moved toward the waiting car and managed to cram inside for the short drive to the main house, where Christian and Leslie broke away and got into their own car to go home. A jeep waited to take Anna-Laura, Roald and Elisabeth to their bungalow, along with Mateo and Anna-Kristina. But before Christian and Leslie could get away, Roald slung himself into the back seat of their car. "I've never seen your house," he said. "I want to know if it's a decent place, and anyway, just now I don't feel like being around Mother."

His aunt and uncle exchanged a glance and Leslie shrugged; Christian started the car and drove away down the lane. "All right," he said, without enthusiasm.

Roald was silent till Christian pulled into the driveway; then he slid out and stared at the house from beside the car while Christian and Leslie gathered their luggage from the back and started for the door. He fell in beside them and offered, "Not bad, Uncle Christian, but it's pretty small. What's the story with the construction?"

"A new wing with three bedrooms," Christian said, releasing a yawn of his own. "Two upstairs, with a bathroom, and a guest suite on the lower level."

"Ah," said Roald. "Too bad it's not finished now. Even if it's attached to your house, I'd still rather stay here than with Mother and a screaming baby."

"All we have right now is a futon in the living room," said Leslie. "I think you'd prefer a room of your own in the bungalow. We're going back to the main house in a couple of hours or so, but right now I need a nap."

Christian sighed deeply. "I do too," he admitted. "Unfortunately, I can't—Mateo told me there's a major problem with a client's website, and I'll have to go into the office and deal with it there. If you'd rather, my Rose, I'll call Mr. Roarke from there and ask him to send a car for you. I think you're better off sleeping."

"Okay, go ahead and do that, my love," Leslie agreed. Christian unlocked the door and ushered his wife and nephew inside, then followed them in and pushed the door shut with one foot. Leslie added, "If you want to leave now, I'll unpack and then get some sleep."

Roald peered at them. "You two have become unbelievably boring."

"I'm no longer in my twenties, Roald, and Leslie is pregnant—and we've both just come off a series of long, exhausting flights," Christian reminded him. "There's little to see around here, so I think it's best that you come into town with me." He kissed Leslie and said, "We'll see you at the main house later on."

"Okay," she said and smiled. "Good luck with that site, my love. Roald, you might be interested in looking around the town square. I admit we're not exactly Monaco, or London, Paris or New York…but we're not meant to be. You can swim at the pool or the beach, or you can ride horseback. We have a casino too, if that interests you."

Roald shrugged. "Maybe I'll look at that later. Well, Uncle Christian, if you're going, then for fate's sake let's get out of here."

Christian sighed, aimed a rueful smile at Leslie, and started for the door. "Come on, then. _Herregud_, all I want is to sleep till next Thursday. You know, Leslie, my Rose, I think your sleeping habit is beginning to rub off on me." He grinned at her answering laugh and led Roald out the door.

On the way into Amberville Roald peered at Christian and remarked in their native tongue, "This must be about the most boring place on earth to live. All they have here is a casino? What goes on around here anyway?"

"How insular you are—especially for a prince, and in this day and age!" Christian observed, shaking his head a few times. "This island is a vacation resort above all else, Roald, but Mr. Roarke's livelihood is given over to granting fantasies."

"Fantasies?" Roald echoed, squinting.

Christian nodded. "Whatever people's wildest dreams are, he can make them come true. Meeting famous people, becoming something you've always wished you were, traveling back in time…he can do quite nearly anything. Leslie is his assistant, and I myself have even helped out on a few occasions." He grinned. "Some of the things I've seen, I've had a very hard time believing."

Roald made a noise and settled back in his seat. "Suppose, in that case, he brings Axel and Ceci back to life."

"That, he can't do," said Christian quietly. "Mr. Roarke may be something more than merely human, but he too has his limits, and resuscitating the dead isn't one of his abilities. Otherwise we'd all have certain loved ones still with us. Leslie and I would both have our mothers back, for instance." He sighed a little and slowed for the turn into the Old Swamp Road, the shortcut route that connected the northern and southern arms of the Ring Road. "You may think this beneath you, but Leslie forgot to mention that there's an amusement park farther down the island. There are distractions here if you're willing to look for them, but don't expect the sort of thrill-seeking opportunities you were searching out back in Sundborg. Mr. Roarke not only runs a business here, but owns the entire island, and is the ultimate authority. This is actually a sovereign territory in itself. Try to pull some stunt, and I can guarantee you it will get back to him—and your mother and I will let him deal with you as he wishes. If you think I'm bluffing, try it once."

Roald snorted and muttered, "I get the message, damn it. You've really changed, Uncle Christian. You used to do crazy things sometimes."

"Not on your level," Christian retorted shortly. "Suppose we drop this particular topic—I can see that no matter how much I try to convince you, all you can remember is my occasional public flare-up of rebelliousness. You'll have to learn for yourself."

Roald let out another snort and looked out his side of the car. "For a vacation resort, it sure looks primitive. Nothing but jungle! Why aren't there more buildings?"

"Mr. Roarke's policy," said Christian. "He's a very forward-thinking man."

"It looks deserted out here," Roald said. "I suppose your office is in the middle of nowhere at all."

"It's in town," Christian said. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Roald shrug, but didn't bother responding. He had some hope that Jonathan would be in when they got to his office; with any luck he and Roald might strike up a friendship. As it happened, by some great stroke of luck, not only was Jonathan at work, so was his twin brother, who was currently between work gigs. "I'm seeing double," Christian wisecracked, coming into the office and heading for his desk.

"Hi there, Boss Prince," said Jonathan cheerfully. "This is my brother Jeremy."

"Ah, I see. Hello, Jeremy," Christian said, and shook hands with Jeremy Ichino.

"Boss Prince?" Roald echoed blankly from the doorway where he still stood.

"Yep," Jonathan said easily. "He's my boss, and he was still a prince when we started working for him, so my sister and I call him 'Boss Prince'. He took it well."

Roald gave Christian an assessing look and then remarked, "Probably better than I would have done. You're one of his employees, then?"

Christian paused behind his desk. "My accountant, Jonathan Ichino," he said. "Jonathan and Jeremy, this is my nephew, Prince Roald Lagnebring."

"Oh," the twin brothers chorused and both arose to favor Roald with a bow, which the young prince acknowledged with the customary nod. "Nice to meet you, Prince," Jeremy offered, and Roald smiled slightly.

Christian glanced at him and said, "Well, find a place to sit, Roald, and think about making some polite conversation. I have some work to do over here." He pulled open a desk drawer, dropped something into it and sat down behind his computer. Roald watched his uncle for a moment, then looked at Jonathan and Jeremy, who regarded him with a clear decrease in their initial friendliness toward him.

Finally Roald said, "So are you two natives of this place?"

"Born and raised," Jonathan confirmed.

"Don't you ever want to get out and see the world?" Roald asked, amazed.

Jonathan shrugged, but Jeremy gave him a rueful grin. "Well, sure, don't most people from small places? My family all think I'm a case of arrested mental development because I'm a roadie."

"A roadie…? Oh, you mean one of those people who carries around a band's instruments and so on when they're on tour," Roald said, unwillingly impressed.

Jonathan grinned and nudged his brother. "Still don't want to find a real job, huh, Jer? Mom and Dad aren't quite ready to give up on you yet."

"They'll have to," said Jeremy. "I'm not done gallivanting yet. Anyway, I'm between tours right now, and the next one's not for almost a month, so I'm taking a break here at home. Thought I'd come in with Jonathan and see how the other half lives."

Jonathan cracked, "Yeah, the richer half." Christian laughed; Jeremy grinned again, good-naturedly, and Jonathan smirked. Roald half-smiled despite himself. "So," Jonathan went on, "you came back with Boss Prince and Miss Leslie?"

Roald nodded. "Mother and I and my niece," he said a little distantly, his eyes losing focus for a moment. Jonathan and Jeremy both stilled and watched him; Christian, though he appeared to be absorbed in his work, had an ear on the conversation nonetheless. After a moment Roald noticed the twins' scrutiny and explained, "Mother is Uncle Christian's sister. My niece was orphaned less than a week ago—my sister Ceci and her husband were killed in a car crash last Sunday."

The twins winced. "Oh, man, that's brutal," Jeremy said. "Damn shame."

"I'm sorry, Your Highness," Jonathan offered quietly.

Roald stared at them for a moment, then shrugged one shoulder, unconsciously reminiscent of his uncle. "It's all right," he muttered.

"It is?" Jonathan asked incredulously. "Man, it just happened! How can it be all right, now or ever? Don't you even miss your sister?"

Roald's head snapped up and his expression iced over. "I don't want to discuss my sister," he said flatly. "Not now, and not with you."

Jonathan made a noise and deliberately returned his attention to his computer; after a few seconds he said, "By the way, Boss Prince, Anton and Julianne are both out on call. I think Julianne oughta be back anytime."

"That's fine," said Christian. "Roald, do you even know how to properly accept condolences, or is this just your rebellious nature again?"

Roald shot out of his chair. "I have no reason to sit and listen to you chastising me or people offering false sympathy," he snapped. "I'm going where I will, and neither you nor anyone else is going to stop me." He stalked out the door.

Jeremy whistled low. "That's one disturbed dude."

Christian sighed and agreed, "You're right, he is, but he refuses to give his grief the outlet it needs, and I don't know how to get through to him. It may take something drastic. I apologize for his rudeness."

"Aw, that's not your problem to apologize for, Boss Prince," Jonathan said. "It really is a shame about your niece's death, and her husband's too. How old's their daughter?"

"Only seven months," Christian said softly. "Anna-Laura will have to raise Elisabeth now. I don't know how she's going to manage it, since she has her own grief to deal with."


	4. Chapter 4

§ § § -- December 22, 2003

Once delivered to her bungalow along with the baby, Anna-Laura looked listlessly around the comfortably furnished main room, eyed hers and Roald's suitcases waiting near the door, and then gazed at the sleeping baby in her arms. The door opened one more time as she stood there, and she turned to watch the native man place two more bags of Elisabeth's things on the floor next to the rest. "May we assist you with anything else, Your Highness?" he asked respectfully.

Anna-Laura opened her mouth, hesitated, then sighed quietly. "No," she said.

"We're just a phone call away if you need anything, Your Highness," the young man said with a bow. "Please make yourself at home." Anna-Laura nodded without enthusiasm, and he bowed once more and left.

The princess ventured slowly into the large bedroom and found a lovely iron-postered canopy bed inside, draped with sheer snow-white netting and made up with what must be the softest white down comforter she'd ever seen. An adorable white wicker bassinet rested not too far from the bed, well padded and furnished with a small pillow and a lightweight blanket. Gently Anna-Laura laid little Elisabeth into the bassinet and discovered in the process that it rocked; she set it to gently swinging, loosely draped the blanket over her granddaughter, and then caught sight of her own reflection in the mirror hanging over the dresser. _"Herregud,_ I look like hell," Anna-Laura muttered aloud. She had reason for her bedraggled, hopeless look. She had just lost one of her children, and the other was pulling away from her, deliberately and consciously closing himself off from the people he needed most in these difficult days.

She had been through bereavement before, more so perhaps than her brothers. While the entire family had been heavily affected by the deaths of Queen Susanna in 1985 and King Arnulf in 1995, and then of King Arnulf II in 2001, she alone had been devastated by the assassination of her husband, Esbjörn, in 1982. It had been determined to be politically motivated, as just before his death he had been elected head of parliament in what had been called a landslide election, and rumors had immediately sprung up that it had come about because of his marriage into the royal family. Esbjörn had already had a promising career in politics when he and Anna-Laura had met at the 1975 royal Christmas ball; but he'd been only thirty-two when he was elected parliamentary head, the youngest by far in Lilla Jordsö's history to hold the office. Esbjörn's assassin had been apprehended within seconds of the shooting, but Esbjörn had lived barely long enough to see it happen. He had died within five minutes of being shot, and it had taken Anna-Laura several months in nearly total seclusion to begin to move beyond the tragedy.

At the time, Cecilia had been four and Roald two; they'd grown up knowing the warmth of a close-knit family, with their grandfather and three uncles providing the fatherly influence that Esbjörn would have. Ceci had become close to her equally feminine cousin Anna-Kristina, sharing long talks about clothes, reveling in the many social events the family was asked to take part in. Roald, on the other hand, apparently had something of his uncle Christian in him. He was only a mediocre student and absorbed barely enough material in his Royal Comportment classes to satisfy his grandfather. Anna-Laura shook her head at the thought. She could remember Christian chafing at times against having to take the classes, but he'd done far better in them than Roald had; yet Roald had been allowed to coast. _It must be true, grandchildren get away with more than children do,_ Anna-Laura thought. Her father had been more indulgent of his grandchildren than his children, but his most exacting discipline had always been reserved for Christian alone. To this day Anna-Laura sometimes found herself wondering how their father's death had really affected her younger brother. He had been reticent in the days after the king's death, and at the funeral had stood in utter silence, showing no emotion whatsoever. She secretly suspected he'd been relieved. In the meantime, Roald had begun to emulate Christian to some extent from about that point, and now in the wake of Cecilia's death, he'd withdrawn, expressing himself only in ways that the rest of the family heartily disapproved of. Anna-Laura wondered what was going to happen now that her son was here on Fantasy Island, what he might try to get away with.

The phone rang in the main room, and she walked quickly out to answer it, pulling the bedroom door shut on the way so as not to disturb Elisabeth. "Hello?"

"Hello, Your Highness, this is Mr. Roarke. I merely called to inquire how you have been settling in," said the warm Latin accent on the other end of the line.

"Oh, Mr. Roarke," Anna-Laura said and bit her lip. "I suppose we're all right. I seem to recall my son going off with Christian and Leslie…"

"Yes, he got into their car just before they left," Roarke said. "There's no question that he's in good hands with them. My concern is for you, however. I repeat my earlier offer: if there is anything at all that I can do for you—"

In the absence of her son, her brother and her sister-in-law, Anna-Laura had a sudden overwhelming need to talk to someone, anyone. Leslie had demonstrated total trust in this man, and she well remembered meeting him at Christian and Leslie's wedding nearly three years before. Somehow he inspired at least a modicum of trust in everyone, she sensed; how else could she explain her abrupt need to unload on him? "I think you can, Mr. Roarke," she said in a slightly shaky voice. "Could you send someone over to keep an eye on my granddaughter, perhaps? I actually find a desperate need to speak with you. I hope you have some time to spare."

"Of course, Your Highness," Roarke said warmly. "I'll see to it that someone is brought over to watch the baby for you, and a driver will bring you here to the main house."

"Thank you, Mr. Roarke," Anna-Laura said, feeling some small measure of relief.

Ten minutes later she had settled herself in the loveseat near the stairs, looking across a low, highly-polished wooden table at Roarke, seated in a chair directly opposite her. They watched while Mariki poured tea for them; then the cook stood up and asked, "Are Prince Christian and Miss Leslie planning to have dinner here, sir?"

"They are," Roarke said and looked at Anna-Laura. "Can we count on your company as well, Your Highness?"

Anna-Laura managed a small smile, to her own surprise. "I wouldn't miss it," she said. "You have a bit of a reputation, Mariki. My brother Carl Johan mentioned coming here specifically to partake of your cooking again."

Mariki grinned broadly. "That's high praise, Your Highness. Does me a world of good. I just wish Miss Leslie felt the same." She rolled her eyes and left, to Roarke's soft chuckling; Anna-Laura looked at him curiously.

"Leslie doesn't like Mariki's cooking?" she asked.

Roarke laughed aloud. "It's not the cooking itself, it's the quantity thereof," he explained. "Mariki has always accused Leslie of not eating enough, but now that Leslie is pregnant, she's become smothering—at least in Leslie's eyes." Anna-Laura snickered softly and settled back in her chair, her hands cradling a delicate porcelain teacup, and Roarke's expression grew concerned. "Tell me, Your Highness, what may I do for you?"

Anna-Laura drew in a deep breath. "I can't tell you how adrift I've felt since my daughter's death," she said and squeezed her eyes closed against the automatic sting of tears. "I wonder if I'm cursed in some way. My husband was killed twenty-one years ago, and now I've lost my daughter. My son was already withdrawing from me before Ceci's death, but not to the extent he has in the last five days."

"Withdrawing, Your Highness?" Roarke asked. "In what way?"

"Christian seems to have bequeathed some of his rebellious nature to Roald," Anna-Laura said, and Roarke smiled. "The trouble is, in Roald it's been amplified to some extent, and much more so since Ceci was…killed."

"Could you specify?" Roarke queried.

"He spends far more time away from home than with the family," Anna-Laura told him. "He has some friends who belong to very rich _jordiska_ families, and thus have the money, the time and the overly indulgent parents to get themselves into trouble. Most of this trouble is of the nuisance variety, but they have a way of flouting the law when it suits them. I haven't found out how to get him away from them, but at the same time it makes me feel strangely guilty. Royalty seldom have true friends, Mr. Roarke, and these are the only ones Roald has. I can remember Christian growing up isolated, and my older brothers and I did as well, although I think we were more resigned to it than Christian was. He had some friends in primary school, but as they grew older and more aware of his elevated status in life, they pulled away from him. It's my understanding that Christian never had a real friend until he came here and met Leslie. I didn't want Roald going through that, so for the most part I turned a blind eye to his escapades." She sighed and admitted, "I can see that I was wrong now…"

"Your intentions were good, Your Highness," Roarke said with a smile.

"Perhaps so," Anna-Laura murmured, "but I think English-speaking people have a saying about the road to hell being paved with good intentions, don't they? I've been afraid for a while that Roald's gone too far for us to have any influence on him now. After Ceci's death…" She paused and blinked back tears, then went on in a wobbling voice: "Roald was gone for several days. He contacted no one at the castle and we didn't know where he was. We had no way of finding him, didn't know whom to get in touch with. We attempted contact with the families of Roald's friends, but they seemed patently unconcerned; in fact, I think the only reason they spoke with our secretary was our status as royals." Roarke nodded understanding. "The night before Ceci and Axel's…f-funeral, the police brought Roald home at last. He was very drunk and babbling nonsense. We had hoped it would remain quiet, but we're too visible for that. Along with all the news articles and reports on the service, there were mentions of Roald being brought home drunk. So he has begun to develop a certain reputation, and I don't think he cares."

"I see," Roarke said slowly. "You mentioned that your husband was killed. Does he have even the slightest memory of his father?"

"None that I know of," Anna-Laura said, "and I doubt the likelihood of it, for he was only two years old when it happened. He rarely asked about Esbjörn, actually; it was as if my brothers and my father provided the male influence he needed. But Christian had some episodes during his twenties, and Roald can remember a great many of these events…so I have a feeling he was influenced by that also."

"Perhaps," Roarke said gently, "but I expect that Roald's choices were of his own making. Christian may have done things that caught your son's interest, but it would seem to me that your nephews saw the same things, and did not choose to emulate them. Roald's choices, Your Highness, are at least as much to do with his personality as with any influence he may have received in his formative years. Forgive me, but you can't lay all the blame at Christian's feet."

Anna-Laura's face heated with embarrassment and she looked at him with a sigh. "Now that I think back, I suppose it does seem that I'm blaming Christian for a lot," she admitted. "And in spite of his rebelliousness, Christian has always had a healthy dose of common sense. He merely wanted independence and to be allowed to make his own choices and lead his own life as he wished. But Roald has never had a clear goal for himself as Christian did, and he's never shown interest in having one. I don't know what it will take for him to pull his life together."

"One thing is certain," Roarke said, leaning forward. "Though it's painful to say, and more so for you to accept, you must realize that no one can change Roald's life except Roald himself. Believe me, Your Highness, I understand all too well how painful it is to watch your child make one mistake after another, and to be unable to make that child see how those mistakes can affect his future. Unfortunately, there is little else a parent can do. One can warn one's child only so much and so far. After that, it's up to the child to make the choice, whether it's the right one or the wrong one. And while you may feel obligated to be his safety net, that too can be detrimental. Allowing Roald to face the consequences of whatever destructive actions he takes will, in the long run, teach him far more than a series of warnings and admonitions and even punishments."

"Carl Johan has said that more than once," Anna-Laura murmured. "I'm afraid I wasn't listening to him."

"You're Roald's mother," Roarke said with a smile. "It's natural for a parent to resent what looks like the interference of others." He regarded Anna-Laura with sympathy and said, "While you are here, Your Highness, you might consider looking after yourself for a time. You've suffered the tragic loss of your daughter and son-in-law, and you've spent a great deal of time worrying over your son; and moreover, you are now entrusted with the care and upbringing of your granddaughter. You have resources here: Christian and Leslie will be glad to help in whatever ways they can, and as I mentioned, I also will do whatever possible to ease your stay here. You need not devote all your time and concern to Roald and the infant. Let Roald take care of himself, and let others care for the baby now and then—and think of yourself. Pamper yourself just a little. Give yourself a chance to begin healing. Take advantage of the services we have to offer, and try to relax a little, to let your cares fall away for a while. You can hardly give little Elisabeth the proper devotion if you neglect your own well-being."

Anna-Laura considered this for a few minutes, then looked up and nodded, slowly and uncertainly. "Yes, Mr. Roarke, perhaps you're right. It seems…wrong somehow, even disrespectful, as though I'm dishonoring my daughter's memory…"

"It's no such thing, Your Highness," Roarke assured her. "It's not at all wrong or disrespectful or lacking in honor. It's merely taking care of yourself so that you will be able to care for your granddaughter—and your son."

"If he'll let me," said Anna-Laura wryly, and Roarke chuckled. With a small smile, she rose and grasped his hand. "I'm grateful to you for taking the time out to let me release some of my worries. I can see why Leslie holds you in such high regard."

Roarke arose as well, smiling dismissively. "I am merely happy to do what I can for you," he said. "I wish you the best of luck—and I might also suggest that we have a day spa in town that you can take advantage of. Your granddaughter is in excellent hands; I've seen to it myself. Take some time for yourself."

"I will," said Anna-Laura and smiled hopefully. "Right now. Thank you, again."

Several hours later she joined Roarke, Christian, Leslie and Roald at dinner; the baby was still under the care of a sitter, and Anna-Laura intended to return to her bungalow after the meal. But the others noticed her refreshed look. "What did you do this afternoon, _äldresyster_?" Christian asked curiously.

"I had myself pampered, just a little," Anna-Laura said. "I had a facial and a wonderful massage, and I even had a pedicure and got my hair trimmed. Somehow I feel a little stronger now…more able to face whatever lies ahead."

Roald snorted. "So your well-being lies in making yourself look good? An interesting way you have of mourning Ceci and Axel."

"I needed to get away," said Anna-Laura. "And before you question me any further, Roald, I'd find it very interesting to know what happened to you all afternoon, that you couldn't be around to care for your niece a little bit."

Roald only shrugged. "I took some walks around here. There's not much else to do."

"There's a lot else to do," Leslie told him. "I'm sorry none of it seems to interest you. Still, sometimes just walking can help. I walked a lot by myself in my first few months here; that's how I got to know all the trails." Roald eyed her thoughtfully but made no further comment; and the conversation moved to other things.

Then Anna-Laura remarked, "You know, Christian, I haven't seen yours and Leslie's house yet. Are you two willing to have company this evening? If not, we can always arrange for tomorrow. I've heard some stories from Anna-Kristina."

Christian smiled and said, "I hope you won't mind waiting until tomorrow. I had to make a trip in to the office after we got back, and I'm more than ready to fall asleep right here at the table, if I dared be so gauche." His wife, sister and father-in-law chuckled. "But we'll be back tomorrow morning, and more than glad to give you the grand tour."

"Just don't mind the construction," Leslie kidded, and Anna-Laura laughed. "Give us a call when you're ready, okay? Our number's 695."

"That's all? Just six-nine-five?" Anna-Laura asked in surprise.

Christian nodded. "It's still a small island, and I understand that not all the population has telephones. We'll come and pick you up when you call."

§ § § -- December 23, 2003

"It's very lovely, and very spacious," Anna-Laura commented in wonder, taking in the interior of Christian and Leslie's house late Tuesday morning. "It looks quite small from the outside, but you've made wonderful use of the space. What rooms will be in the new part?"

"Two bedrooms and a bath upstairs, and a guest suite downstairs for any family who might want to stay for a time," Christian told her. "I suppose I had Carl Johan and Amalia in mind, considering what he's said before about Mariki."

Anna-Laura laughed and gently jounced the baby. "Then I hope it'll be sumptuous enough to fulfill his expectations!" She gazed out the glass doors to the back yard and said somewhat wistfully, "It seems you're more or less isolated out here, except for that house across the street. It feels like a hideaway from the world."

Christian and Leslie looked at each other, and he chuckled a little ruefully before admitting, "Perhaps that's what I had in mind. But I should tell you that it was Leslie who found the plot. I simply happened to like what I saw, and the relative remoteness was just a bonus. The folks across from us are friends of ours, and we're only a few kilometers away from the access road into this area, so we're not complete recluses here. However, being some distance out from the resort end of the island allows us to more fully enjoy the nature around here. At night we can even hear the ocean in the distance."

His sister regarded him with an exaggeratedly knowing look. "Making up for the fact that you had a mid-bank room growing up, and never got to listen to the ocean, unlike all the rest of us…is that it?"

"Stop psychoanalyzing me," Christian ordered, laughing. "Maybe there's something to that, but I never really considered it. So do you like the place, or don't you?"

Anna-Laura grinned and relented, conceding, "To be honest, I'm a little jealous. In fact, I was hoping I might be able to take Elisabeth for a little walk around here and get a closer look at all the exotic flora, and perhaps even some fauna. You two don't have to come along. I just need a little quiet and solitude."

"Go right ahead," said Leslie. "Take all the time you want. Christian and I are planning to relax today, so we'll be here whenever you come back."

They watched her cross the yard with Elisabeth in her luxurious baby stroller and looked at each other. "She seems to be doing better," Christian said with cautious hope.

Leslie nodded, glancing after her sister-in-law. "At least she's getting out and looking around. Father must have talked her into that spa visit yesterday. She wouldn't've known it was there otherwise. But you're right, I think she's already begun the healing process." She looked curiously at Christian. "Did you notice she didn't mention Roald once, from the moment we came to pick her up?"

"Yes, I did," Christian said. "All I can infer from that is that she's decided to worry about herself, make herself stronger, and let Roald handle his own problems. He's certainly old enough. Well, why don't we finish unpacking."

Anna-Laura walked briskly along the lane till she was out of sight of Christian and Leslie's house; then she slowed to a stroll and let herself absorb the sights and sounds around her. Elisabeth was awake and apparently fascinated by the variety of tropical flowers; frequently Anna-Laura caught sight of her granddaughter's hand reaching out to touch one or another. Once, just for a second, a large, brightly-colored butterfly landed on the back of Elisabeth's hand, and she squealed in surprise and delight; the insect promptly fluttered away, and Anna-Laura stopped to watch it heading for the jungle on the other side of the lane. Elisabeth leaned out of the side of the stroller and stretched out towards the vanishing butterfly. "All gone, little one," Anna-Laura said in _jordiska_, with a sad smile. "We might see another one if we watch for it."

She pushed the stroller forward again, and Elisabeth shortly forgot about the butterfly in her renewed fascination with the flowers. But Anna-Laura found herself wishing she could have shared all this with her daughter and son-in-law, and lost herself in wishes and sorrow. By the time she realized where she was, she didn't quite recognize anything around her. She glanced behind her and noticed that she had reached the end of the lane, and was standing in the intersection where it connected with the access road from the Ring Road. She could see traces of some building material—stone or perhaps marble, judging from the light color—through the trees, and suddenly remembered Leslie explaining that this area was called the Enclave and consisted of mansions belonging mostly to reclusive or absentee owners. Sometimes, Leslie had said, Roarke would arrange with one or another absentee owner for the use of a mansion in a fantasy, but otherwise most guests didn't know this neighborhood existed. Again Anna-Laura saw the appeal of a place like this to her privacy-craving younger brother and thought with a flash of humor, _I daresay Christian protests too much about his choice of residence!_

She pushed the stroller across the lane and walked slowly along the tall concealing hedge fronting this particular property. At the far end the hedge stopped and continued along the property line. There was a strip of carefully-tended lawn perhaps five feet wide, set at regular intervals with large stepping stones. At its left was a waist-height white-brick wall setting off the next-door property, which Anna-Laura could see was a curious but appealing architectural mix of Tudor, A-frame and castle tower. A few trees dotted the golf-course-green grounds, but she saw no one out and about. She was about to move on when she heard the quiet trickle of flowing water from somewhere, and instead she turned the stroller down the strip of lawn, steering it around the stepping stones, hearing the trickling sound grow steadily louder. In a few minutes she located its source: a generous koi pond, fed by an ostentatiously large artificial waterfall. The flash of the exotic, expensive fish in the water caught her attention, and she squeezed between the tall bushes forming this section of the hedge, pulling the stroller through after her. Elisabeth's eyes were huge, fixed on the fish darting through the clear water; and Anna-Laura herself found a strange tranquility in just watching them swim.

"What in hell are you doing on my private property?" an angry voice demanded.

Both Anna-Laura and Elisabeth looked up; the baby stared at the tall man standing on the far side of the pond, while Anna-Laura instantly stood up. "Forgive me…I heard the water falling," Anna-Laura explained, "and I wondered what it was. Your pond is lovely."

"Well, you have some nerve, just traipsing along looking for my pond. Before I decide to call the authorities on you, you'd better take your baby and get out." The man scowled at her, and Anna-Laura stared back at him, her royal ire suddenly rising.

"You certainly have a welcoming manner about you," she remarked sarcastically. "Go ahead and phone Mr. Roarke if you will, but I doubt you'll get much satisfaction from that." She raised her chin, murmured to the baby in her own tongue and began to push the stroller back through the bushes.

"Who the hell do you think you are?" the man demanded.

Anna-Laura turned back. "I _think,"_ she retorted icily, "that I am Princess Anna-Laura of Lilla Jordsö. If you need some proof of my identity, then call Mr. Roarke as you said you would do."

"Good Lord," the man uttered, his belligerent demeanor falling away. "I didn't even realize it was you…but I recognize you now. Saw the pictures in my newspaper. What're you doing here on this island?"

"Primarily visiting my brother and sister-in-law," Anna-Laura replied, her voice thawing only slightly. "Perhaps I had better return to them; they wouldn't mind half as much as you do if someone were to admire their property."

The man sighed and ran a hand through his graying caramel-colored hair. "I'm sorry," he said. "It's just that it's been hard for me to maintain my privacy, and I thought I'd finally achieved that goal by buying the island newspaper five years ago and taking up residence in this mansion. Please accept my apologies, Your Highness. Is that your granddaughter?"

Anna-Laura paused, regarded him a little suspiciously and finally nodded. "Yes, this is Elisabeth. We call her Lisi for short. Who, then, are you?"

The man smiled crookedly and said, "Guess my manners are in really short supply today. I'm Gregory Nordeman—publisher by trade. I own ten newspapers in various countries, including the _Fantasy Island Chronicle_, which is why I reside here. Once again, Your Highness, I apologize. Stay and enjoy the pond if you like."

Anna-Laura hesitated, then eyed him curiously. "Don't you ever come out here to look into the pond, Mr. Nordeman? It seems odd to me that you have it here and yet don't like to have people come to see it. The landscaping all but pleads with visitors to come look."

"The landscaping was the previous owner's doing," Nordeman said. "I'd have changed it, but it's more money than I want to bother spending. It's not as if I get a lot of trespassers anyway. And before you wonder, yes, I do come out to look at the pond now and then. It gives me a sense of peace when I need it."

"I was seeking that myself," Anna-Laura said softly, "and it's very good for that. Now I think when I return home, I'll suggest to my brother Carl Johan that we think about putting in a koi pond at the castle. It would be lovely in the front grounds."

Nordeman cleared his throat. "This might sound out of line, but I was just thinking. I didn't give you much of an apology there…I hope you'll let me make up for my rudeness by having dinner here with me. This evening, if you can."

Anna-Laura stared at him. Now that his features had softened, she could see that he was a rather attractive man, perhaps a few years older than she, with a lined face and an oddly haunted look in his blue eyes. He wasn't overweight but was fairly solidly built, and looked as if he tried to keep in shape somewhat, though the slight paunch at his waistline testified otherwise. Finally she said, "Why would you, who seem to value privacy even more highly than my prickly little brother, want to invite a total stranger to dinner?"

"You're not a _total_ stranger anymore," Nordeman pointed out with a faint smile, "now that we know each other's names."

There was silence for a beat; then Anna-Laura laughed, surprising herself perhaps more than him. "I have to admit, you have a point there, Mr. Nordeman."

"Please call me Gregory," he broke in and grinned fully. "Maybe if I'm lucky, you'll forgive me and we can become friends."

Anna-Laura giggled again, surprised to find herself beginning to develop a genuine liking for this man. "I'd certainly rather have a friend than an enemy. Thank you, Gregory, I'd like very much to have dinner here. What time should I arrive?"


	5. Chapter 5

§ § § -- December 23, 2003

Prince Roald Lagnebring had for some reason been plagued by Leslie's offhanded remark about wandering the island paths during her first months here, and remembered what Christian had initially told the family about her when they'd caught him after a trip and demanded to know why he looked so down in the mouth_. Wasn't it after he went with that Italian girl to Japan, or something?_ he thought. _Some strange trade-negotiation thing that Uncle Arnulf came up with? Well, whatever…he did say that Aunt Leslie's an orphan, lost her whole family in a huge fire. It must have been very recent when she first came to this island._ He had shrugged to himself, figuring that it must have helped her, and decided to try it. _Nothing else to do around this place anyway…_

Several hours later he'd had enough solitude. He knew Christian had the day off from work today, but he was too unfamiliar with this place to have any other idea of where he could go to meet people and spend time. So he found his way to Amberville's town square and let himself into the storefront that housed Enstad Computer Services. This time he was greeted not with the identical twins he'd met the day before, but a somewhat stocky blond man, a native islander, and a very pretty Asian girl. They all looked up when he came in, and the native man inquired politely, "May we help you?"

"I was only looking for someone," said Roald, feeling oddly uncomfortable. "Jonathan and Jeremy Ichino. I met them here yesterday…"

The Asian girl spoke up. "Oh, they're my brothers. Jonathan's got a little apartment just outside of town, and Jeremy's staying with my parents till he gets his next roadie gig. Would they recognize your name if I called Jonathan and checked with him?"

"I expect so," Roald told her. "I'm Prince Roald of Lilla Jordsö."

The Asian girl's expression seemed to chill. "Oh, I see," she said. "Well, I'll call Jonathan, but I'm not going to make any promises." She picked up her phone and punched out three numbers. Roald looked thoughtfully around, scanned his uncle's empty desk, then leaned on the edge of it, watching the Asian girl. After a few seconds she said, "Yeah, Jon, it's me. Uh, that prince you met yesterday?…Yeah, that's right, Boss Prince's nephew. Well, he's here looking for you." She was quiet for a moment or two, then shrugged, perhaps in response to something Jonathan said. "Well, if you want to. He'll probably get lost though." She listened again, then laughed. "Okay, it's up to you. Where's Jeremy? Oh, he is? Well, bring him too. Okay, see ya in a few." She hung up and focused on Roald, her demeanor cooling again. "Jonathan and Jeremy are on their way over here."

Roald nodded. "Good," he said, still studying her. "So what's your name?"

"Julianne," she said. "Excuse me, Your Highness, I have work to do."

Roald folded his arms over his chest, without taking his eyes off her. "Is everyone on this island as friendly as you are?"

Julianne smiled sweetly at him. "No, just the ones who don't know what you're really like." She frosted over again and focused on her computer.

"Don't tell me," said Roald sarcastically. "My uncle's been telling everyone what a bad seed I am. The bad-boy prince, whose reputation precedes him. Well, believe me, I don't need overtures from so-called 'friendly types' like you. If you don't want to find out who I really am, then to hell with you, Miss Prim and Proper." He glanced at Mateo and said haughtily, "I'll wait outside." Mateo just nodded, and Roald spun on one heel and marched out the door, lounging against the window outside.

"Very tactful, Julianne," Anton Lauterhoff commented a little reprovingly.

Julianne scowled at him. "Oh, come on, Anton, you've heard Boss Prince's stories about his nephew. He's never mentioned he was improving any. I bet he's here just to cause trouble."

"I think he's here for bereavement," Mateo said, bringing her head around in surprise. "If you got your head out of computer manuals and fashion magazines and read the newspaper now and then, you might have heard that he and Christian's sister are here because Princess Cecilia and her husband were killed in a car accident last week. I don't excuse Prince Roald's actions, but he's certainly grieving for his sister."

"Does that mean I have to grovel at his feet?" demanded Julianne. "Didn't you see the way he was looking at me?"

Mateo and Anton looked at each other. "He did seem to have some interest in you," said Anton and smiled.

"Well, it's not mutual," snapped Julianne heatedly. "The last thing I need in my life is a daredevil prince who flirts with the wrong side of the law and has no other desire in life except to party his brains out all the time. And I don't care if Boss Prince and Miss Leslie, or you and Princess Anna-Kristina, made it work, Mateo. How many times can lightning strike in the same place? I don't want to leave Fantasy Island, and ten to one His Smart-Aleckiness doesn't have any particular wish to move away from Lilla Jordsö. So if you two are thinking about matchmaking, knock it off."

Mateo and Anton both chuckled. "We wouldn't dream of it," Anton assured her.

"Right," said Mateo wryly. "Since we've settled that, back to work." Julianne made a face that earned her a grin from him, and glanced at the window once before returning her full attention to her computer.

Outside, Roald wondered exactly what, and how much, Christian had said about him to his employees_. More than enough, obviously, to make that girl think I'm beneath her,_ he reflected sourly. _Good thing I have no interest in her anyway._ He scanned the square, trying to look bored, but wondering despite himself what his mother, uncle and aunt were doing at the moment. Undoubtedly Christian was working, Leslie was sleeping, and his mother was probably crying over Axel and Ceci. _Isn't that all they ever do now? And you wait, when we get home Mother will probably insist on turning Axel and Ceci's room into some sort of damned shrine to them. And then where will she put Elisabeth—in Uncle Christian's old room? Sure, stick her in a windowless mid-bank room where nobody can hear her if she cries and where she'll never see the sun._ For a moment he wondered how Christian had stood it, being stuck in that room during his first two decades or so. _No wonder he moved out when he could._ Vaguely, for a moment, Roald wanted to do the same, and then he dismissed the idea, telling himself a prince didn't go out and pay rent or mortgages like common people. Deep within him, though, he knew the real answer to that: he wasn't qualified to do anything that would allow him to make his own way as his uncle had done—and that was at his own choice. Roald growled low in his throat and glanced up, relieved when he saw Jonathan and Jeremy Ichino crossing the square in his direction.

"Hello, Your Highness," they said together when they came within earshot, and Roald recognized the reserved quality to their voices. Unsure as to whether it was due to his title or his attitude, he took quick refuge in carelessness.

"Hello," he replied and shrugged. "So what's there to do around here? I thought you could give me some ideas."

The twins looked at each other. "Probably nothing you'd be interested in," Jeremy noted after a moment. "Jon and I surf sometimes, when we can, and we do some sailing."

"I sail," Roald broke in, and again the twins exchanged a look. "I can't surf—the ocean's too wild at home—but I do sail. A friend of mine is the son of the most revered boatbuilder in Lilla Jordsö, and we've taken the family boat out on many occasions."

Jonathan nodded. "Well, we could rent a cat or something at the marina," he said.

"You mean, you don't have your own boat?" Roald asked in genuine surprise.

"We're not all as rich as you are," Jeremy informed him a little sarcastically. "Geez, man—Your Highness—what do you actually _do_ with all your time? What in heck does it really mean to be a prince, anyway, if all you can do is spend money and party hearty? Look, I hear one of your cousins has loads of charities she devotes her time to, like Princess Diana did. And your cousin Anna-Kristina actually married a commoner—even though she was going to be queen once—and is working, and not even complaining about it. My brother and sister know your uncle Christian better than I do, but man, from everything I ever heard, he's the least prince-like prince I ever knew of. So what do _you_ do?"

Annoyed, affronted and offended all at once, Roald launched himself off the window and stood straight. "Forget it," he snarled. "I'll find something to do on my own. There's no reason on earth I should have to answer your questions." He stalked away from them, boiling silently, determined to go to the main house and make a few demands. He'd had it with this place and all these self-righteous people.

It took him more than an hour to finally get to the main house via trails; he had no wish to see people and had been avoiding the roads that would have taken him there far more quickly. When he found himself on what looked like a private terrace, he almost turned back for a moment before recognizing the interior of Roarke's study. The island's owner was seated behind his desk, evidently working on something. Roald crossed the terrace and strode right in, making Roarke look up.

"Hello, Your Highness, may I help you?" Roarke inquired, standing and offering the young prince a shallow bow.

Roald dipped his head a bit in acknowledgement and stopped between the two leather chairs. "Yes," he said without preamble, "I want to return home, beginning with the next flight away from here."

Roarke regarded him curiously. "We can do so if you wish, Your Highness," he said, "but if I may…does your mother know that you wish to leave?"

"No, does that matter?" Roald asked.

"I should think it would," Roarke observed, a slight, amused glint winking in his dark eyes for just a half-second or so before he resumed his chair. "I daresay she would be quite upset upon hearing you had departed so suddenly."

"I'm sure she would," Roald said sarcastically, dropping into one of the chairs. "At this point that doesn't matter to me. I just want to leave."

"May I ask why?" Roarke queried.

"There's nothing to do here," Roald said. "I've tried to make friends here, but it seems Uncle Christian has poisoned my reputation before these people ever met me, and now they all think I'm some sort of criminal in training. I'm sure the local police have half an eye on me, waiting for me to rob or vandalize something, or belt down a few dozen drinks at some bar and then get into a fight. Why even bother trying to find something constructive to do when everyone expects me to break the law in some fashion?"

Roarke studied him. "Before you go on," he said gently, "I can assure you that the police are not watching you in any way. They have no reason to do so. I'll admit that I myself have heard Christian tell a few stories about you—" He saw Roald sit up and open his mouth, about to explode with indignation, and raised his palm at the prince. "However, it was with concern, Your Highness, not censure. Now, I can't control what Christian's employees may have done with anything he's said to them, but I have no doubt that he never meant to denigrate you in any way. In some ways he was somewhat embarrassed, for he remembers his own occasional escapades all too well."

Roald scowled and slumped in his chair, observing, "Well, even if Uncle Christian's intentions weren't actually bad, it seems to be the way his tall tales have been interpreted."

"Perhaps it's only the way he told them," said Roarke. "But I believe that not only he but also your mother has been harboring hopes that you might soon discover something that will interest you enough to investigate it further—whether it be a cause, a career, or even a hobby. I understand that your cousin, Princess Margareta, devotes her days to assorted charitable causes, and that your cousin Prince Rudolf has followed in his father's footsteps and holds a degree in landscape architecture. Perhaps you need not work for a living, in your station, but surely you can think of something that you truly enjoy, which you might like to promote in some way?"

Roald, brought up short, sat there with his mouth open, wondering what he could possibly do along such a line. What sort of hobbies had he ever really had, outside of his odd tastes in music growing up? He looked helplessly at Roarke and shrugged. "I suppose I'll have to think about that one, Mr. Roarke," he admitted. "All I can come up with are odd fixations I had in my childhood. I used to love punk and goth-metal music—which is why it was such a thrill for me when Uncle Christian was seeing a punk singer when I was nine—and I was certain that when I grew up I was going to live quite the life of leisure. Do what I wanted, anytime I wanted…you know?" Roarke chuckled softly, and Roald grinned a little and continued, "Actually, the year before that, I got hooked on martial-arts films. I think over the next three years, I found some way to see every karate-chop flick that was ever made. Mother used to get exasperated with me, but she consented when I asked to start taking lessons. I must have had some talent for it. By the time I was eighteen I was a brown belt." He stopped and thought back, then frowned. "Then I dropped the lessons and the matches I used to take part in."

"For college, perhaps?" Roarke prompted.

Roald's face heated up. "No," he admitted reluctantly, "after I received my completion certificate, I'd had enough of school and wanted no more. My cousin Margareta never went either, but no one raised quite as much fuss about it as they did when I decided against going. I suppose it's different for males. In any case, I started taking up with the friends I have now. I learned to sail, and…" He stopped again, then cleared his throat, suddenly oddly ashamed to say it. "Well, not much else. One of these friends is the son of the most prominent shipwright in all Lilla Jordsö. But he's…something of a delinquent. For that matter, my other friends enjoy walking the fine edge of legality as well…" He gave Roarke a wary look, and the older man smiled and relaxed in his chair.

"Don't worry, Your Highness, I am not here to judge you," Roarke told him. "I do find it quite interesting that you seem to have lost interest in the martial arts once you finished your schooling. Do you still have enough interest that you might be willing to involve yourself in that world once again? Perhaps to get your black belt, and go on competing? You might then be willing either to teach the art, or to possibly found a group of others who are interested in it also." He folded his hands over his stomach, smiling warmly, as though he knew full well he had the young prince's avid attention. "There have been stories of various sports helping to give disadvantaged children a focus, something productive and positive that they can focus on and be proud of. You are in a unique position to provide something similar. Leslie may know, perhaps through her friends, of some opportunities that you could take advantage of right here on the island. You could start a group here, perhaps…'get the hang of it', I believe the phrase is…and find what area you'd like to focus on. Find others with the same interests, put out the word, teach some of what you know…then, when it's time for you to return home, you'll have a better idea of what you wish to do there. Not only will you be better equipped to get a project underway in your home country, but you will have left behind a positive legacy here. And that, my dear prince, can only help the reputation that you feared preceded you here."

Roald had to grin at that. "When you put it that way, Mr. Roarke, it's hard to say no. The more I hear of this, the better I like it. Can you help me also?"

"Of course, Your Highness, of course," Roarke said warmly, sitting up again and smiling at him. "Christian and Leslie and your mother will be having dinner here again this evening, and we can discuss it at that time."

Roald grinned. "That's excellent. I'm very glad I came here. I had all intentions of leaving here and going on with things as they were…but something tells me I probably wouldn't have had much heart for it anyway. That shipbuilding friend of mine…we've known each other since _primaskolan_, and we used to watch many of those old films together. Between us both, we should have influence and money to build an organization that can help underprivileged children all over Lilla Jordsö. Thank you, Mr. Roarke."

"Not at all," said Roarke. "I am merely glad that I was able to help you in some way. From here, it's your project, and whatever assistance you need, you need only let me know and I will provide it." He stood up. "I hope you'll excuse me, but I have a short trip to make to the island's orphanage this afternoon."

"I'd like to accompany you, if I could," Roald said, rising also. "I could begin to spread the word there—perhaps find out if any of the children there might have some interest in learning karate or another martial art." When Roarke nodded, he added, "And I hope that there will be girls as well as boys who would be interested in the project. My cousins and my mother would raise a terrible fuss if I included only boys." He grinned when Roarke laughed, and together the two departed the main house.


	6. Chapter 6

§ § § -- December 23, 2003

"What do you mean, you're not coming with us for dinner at the main house?" asked Christian in surprise, staring at his sister. "Why not?"

"I have a dinner date," said Anna-Laura primly.

Christian and Leslie looked at each other in amazement; then Leslie grinned. "That's wonderful, Anna-Laura!" she said. "Who with?"

"You might recognize the name," Anna-Laura told her. "Gregory Nordeman."

Leslie thought for a moment, then blinked and stared at her anew. "How did you manage that? The only time Father or I've ever seen him was when he first came here looking to buy a home. He's almost a hermit—he owns the island newspaper, and Myeko said she's seen him a couple of times, chewing out some suits in the upper echelons over there." She sat up and leaned forward. "Father got the sense that he'd been through a lot of sadness in his life, but the guy wouldn't talk. He insisted he have his privacy and that no one bother him, and we respected his wishes. I should warn you, Myeko tells me he has a rather nasty reputation over at the newspaper. They see him as some sort of lofty dictator."

"Well, I'll admit that he was no friendlier with me when I first saw him. I saw a koi pond on his property and was admiring it, and he came out demanding to know why I was trespassing in his yard. When I told him who I was, it began to soften him up somewhat, and suddenly he asked me to have dinner with him. I don't quite understand it, but I agreed anyhow. I thought perhaps I'd let him properly apologize," Anna-Laura said.

Christian laughed and pointed out, "Anna-Laura, you were the one on his property!"

"I told him I had meant only to admire his koi pond," she said defensively. "I didn't think there was any need for him to be so rude and unforgiving."

Leslie giggled and Christian shrugged, still grinning. "Well," he said, "all I can say is that you're quite lucky you are who you are, _äldresyster_. In that case, I hope you enjoy dinner with this Mr. Nordeman. What about Lisi?"

"Oh yes," Anna-Laura said. "I haven't seen or heard from Roald all day, and I don't dare trust him with the baby. Would you two be willing to keep her?"

Christian looked at Leslie, who lit up. "That sounds like fun," she said.

Christian snickered. "Fun, my Rose? It's pretty obvious you've never cared for a baby before. I suppose I'd better be here to let you know what to do when Lisi cries for some reason and you find yourself coming up short on what to do about it."

"Don't be smug, Christian Enstad," Leslie said and bopped him playfully on the arm. "I actually think it's great practice for when we have ours. Hey, I have to learn sometime."

"So you do," he agreed. "It's just lucky I have experience with my nieces and nephews in their infancy. I still remember Arnulf and Kristina constantly recruiting me to watch Anna-Kristina while they were out at yet another party."

Anna-Laura remarked, "I sometimes thought she was going to start calling you Pappa when she began to talk. I think it would have served Arnulf right." They all laughed. "But thank you both. I don't know how the evening will go, and I'm sure I'll worry about both Lisi and Roald, but—"

"Don't," Leslie broke in. "Roald can handle himself for a while, and since Christian is the self-titled baby expert around here, I can watch him change Lisi's diaper and feed her while I get to have fun playing with her." With that, she stuck out her tongue at Christian, who rolled his eyes; and Anna-Laura burst out laughing.

"You two are fun to watch," she remarked. "Always teasing each other."

"You go and have a good time," Christian said wickedly, "while I discipline my wife for that smart little remark. Do you need a ride back to your bungalow?"

Anna-Laura hesitated, and Leslie stood up. "Don't worry about that. I'll give Father a call and he can send someone out here with whatever you need. Just tell me what you want to have brought over."

Three hours later Leslie drove Anna-Laura the two miles down their lane to the main access road for the Enclave. "Oh," she said when Anna-Laura gestured at the hedge-fronted property, "now I remember. This place used to belong to some really elderly count somewhere in Europe, and his heirs put it up for sale after he died. It sat on the market for almost two years before Mr. Nordeman came along and bought it. The sellers told Father he could make use of it if he needed to, while it was up for sale, so he used it for a fantasy once in a while. I got to see the inside a couple of times. Beautiful house."

"It looks quite large from the outside," remarked Anna-Laura as Leslie let the car coast down the long driveway.

"Sixty rooms or so, I think," Leslie said, nodding. "Well, here you go. If you need a ride home, just call us, and either Christian or I will come and pick you up. I hope you two have a wonderful dinner. It sounds like a really nice friendship is in the works."

"I hope so," Anna-Laura said reflectively, sitting there for a moment and considering it. She looked at Leslie. "It's been more than twenty years since Esbjörn was killed. In the last few years I had begun to think it might be time for me to consider finding someone else, but it's very difficult for a princess. Gregory knows who I am, but he wasn't intimidated, which for me is a good first sign."

Leslie grinned. "Then I wish you both luck. I can't wait to hear how everything goes. Have a lovely evening." Anna-Laura smiled, thanked her and got out, watching her back out of the lane again on her way to the front door.

The main entrance consisted of two large, heavy wooden doors varnished black and adorned with highly polished brass rings. Anna-Laura grasped one and knocked several times, then took a step or two back and waited. Faintly she heard the fading sound of Leslie and Christian's car's engine retreating back down the side lane; otherwise there was only the constant chirping of birds, including the intermittent squall of a distant peacock.

Then the door opened and Gregory Nordeman looked out at her; he smiled, then bowed to her and said, "Your Highness—welcome, come on in. You have perfect timing; I was just finishing setting the table. I hope you're hungry."

"Famished, in fact," Anna-Laura admitted with a sheepish chuckle, stepping inside when he moved aside for her. She stopped in the entry and looked around with an assessing eye. "What a lovely entryway," she commented. "Just that elegant light overhead and the mirror on the wall, and that little mail table there. It lets the wall décor stand out."

"I tend to be minimalist in my decorating," Gregory said, closing the door. "Follow me, Your Highness, if you would."

"Please call me Anna-Laura," the princess requested hopefully. "It hardly seems fair for you to continue using the honorific when you've told me to call you Gregory."

"Thank you, Anna-Laura," he said, glancing back at her and smiling again. "I generally hate standing on ceremony, but I know royalty's different. This is my den here." He gestured at a large room to their left, paneled in blond wood that Anna-Laura instantly recognized as Scandinavian in atmosphere. The bookcases were all blond wood also; there were darker wooden blinds at the windows, and one painting on an otherwise unadorned wall, over a huge oaken desk. "The kitchen and dining room are back this way."

Anna-Laura liked the sparse, clean look of his interior rooms, but she had the feeling that something was missing all the same. Part of her mind wrestled with the thought, trying to figure it out, while she paused for Gregory to pull out a chair for her. Smiling at him, she sat down and let him finish seating her, then surveyed the table while he took his own seat. She found herself impressed by the layout and recognized several dishes that were uniquely _jordisk_ in origin. "I hope," she said, "that you didn't go to all this trouble just for me."

"Not necessarily," Gregory said with another smile at her. "As a matter of fact, I have Jordsonian ancestry. Or maybe I should use the proper term and say _'jordisk'_ instead." His smile became a grin. "Just about a year ago I bought out a notorious tabloid in Lilla Jordsö, and ever since then I've been trying to turn it into a respectable publication. I ended up firing ninety-five percent of the writers and hiring new ones—mostly college graduates who were perfectly happy to work for an initially low paycheck just to get a foot in the journalistic door." He began to dole out portions of assorted items onto her plate. "I wanted to get people to try the new look and format of the thing, so I lowered the cover price, cut the salary of the few remaining staff by about twenty percent, and issued a few ultimatums about what I would accept and what I wouldn't. No gossip, no feeding the rumor mills, no made-up stories, no speculations, and no pictures taken of any celebrities without their permission or at least their knowledge. I made a few other changes as well, but those were the most important ones to me."

Anna-Laura raised an eyebrow, very much impressed. "Now that I think of it," she mused, "it does seem as if there are somewhat fewer so-called reporters dogging our steps when we go out. Which of the tabloids did you buy?" He told her the name of it, and she stared at him, wide-eyed. _"Herregud,_ that was the worst one in the city!"

"Precisely," Gregory said, loading his own plate now. "I think it's been turning around pretty well, although it's still struggling. But I'd rather have a slow-selling, decent magazine than a best-selling dirty rag. I have some integrity, and I think that's too rare in this world."

"I as well," murmured Anna-Laura faintly, glancing around the room, wondering at this prickly man with the sense of honor. She took a bite of a fish dish and exclaimed, "This is wonderful!"

Gregory looked up sharply, then grinned. "I'm glad to hear it. I spent all afternoon cooking and hoping it'd come out right."

"You didn't," said Anna-Laura, blinking. "Oh, Gregory…I never expected you to go to so much trouble just for my sake."

"I told you I wanted to present a proper apology," he said, pausing in his own eating to reach out and grasp her hand for a moment. "I hope I did."

"I daresay you outdid yourself," she told him. They looked at each other for several long seconds, blue eyes and hazel ones searching each other; then the moment grew too intense. She blushed, he released her hand, and they resumed eating, neither speaking for a while. Anna-Laura savored the food and wondered where he'd learned to cook like this.

"So what are your plans for Christmas?" she asked idly after a little while. "I think it will be quite the novelty being on a tropical island like this for the holiday. I'm likely to spend the day with my brother Christian and his wife; they haven't been in Lilla Jordsö for Christmas at all, and I suppose I can see the lure of their own home during the holiday. It's going to be difficult enough without Ceci…" She closed her eyes and tried not to break down in front of Gregory. He remained silent, and it gave her a chance to recover. "In any case, I'm glad not to be alone. What will you be…" She looked up and her voice trailed off: Gregory's expression had frosted over.

"Nothing," he said coldly. "I give all my employees the damned thing off if they want it, but I spend the day working. There's no one for me to go to."

And that was when Anna-Laura realized what was missing in this mansion. "You don't have any family photographs on the walls," she said without thinking. "Why not?"

"I have no family," he informed her tightly, and she felt her face heating up in a new blush. "Would you mind changing the subject?"

She regarded him nervously for a few seconds, then gave one stiff nod. "I beg your pardon for intruding," she said formally and returned her full concentration to her plate.

This time the silence went on for so long that Anna-Laura could no longer continue eating. She was used to the company—and constant chatter—of her family at the table, and the quiet felt extremely unnatural to her. She wanted to ask where there might be a powder room, so she could escape even for a moment to try to regain her composure; but she didn't dare open her mouth. She was too close to tears—not only from the ongoing pain of losing Cecilia, but now from her own discomfort and increasing unease. Their people had always seen Princess Anna-Laura Enstad Lagnebring as a strong woman with no fear of standing up for either herself or others; but right now she felt like a small child who had just committed an egregious breach of good manners.

"Is the food all right?" Gregory asked suddenly, startling her.

Anna-Laura's gaze snapped to his, and she told herself to remain composed in front of this man. "It's very good, thank you," she said as she might have to a waiter in a particularly fancy restaurant. "It has all been delicious, and I appreciate the effort you exerted." She drew in a breath while he stared at her without expression. "However, I believe I've overstayed my welcome. If you'll kindly excuse me, I'll take my leave of you—"

"No," he broke in. "Please stay."

She sat frozen in mid-sentence with her mouth open to form the next word. _What does he want of me?_ came the thought, a little impatient, a little desperate. At last she found her voice again. "I was no longer certain I was welcome," she informed him stiffly.

"Why not?" he asked.

"It seems," Anna-Laura said, taking refuge behind the cold royal formality she'd grown up using among all sorts of dignitaries at home, "that I have somehow stepped over another boundary with you. I dare not remain any longer to possibly repeat the mistake. In any case, I'm sure that you prefer to be alone." She pushed back her chair and stood up, then pivoted on one heel and started out of the room, hoping madly that she could remember the way to the main entrance. She didn't care if she had to walk all the way back to Christian and Leslie's house; all she wanted was to get out of here.

"Anna-Laura, please!" Gregory exclaimed, and though she heard him get out of his chair and follow her, she kept walking. "Please wait…" When she didn't stop, he reached out and seized her arm. "Please."

Forced to stop, she eyed him warily. "If I stay," she said after a moment, "perhaps you had better tell me what is and is not acceptable dinner conversation for you."

Gregory winced and muttered, "Damn. Anna-Laura, I don't mean to drive you away. I guess I've been a loner too long. Look…if you'll agree to stay here and finish dinner with me, and let me serve you the special dessert I made just for this occasion, then…then I'll explain why I said what I did, and why it bothers me as it does." He cleared his throat. "Will you stay, please?"

"Don't feel obligated," she said softly, raising her eyebrow at him again. "Personally, I'd far rather talk about losing Ceci with someone. However, that's only how I am."

He hung his head for a moment, closing his eyes and breathing sharply in through his nose, as if trying to gather himself. When he looked up, there was a strange expression on his face, an uncertainty that Anna-Laura suspected seldom, if ever, appeared there. "I hope you can forgive me," Gregory said. "It's just that it's never been easy for me to talk about anything with anyone, especially not something like that. I, uh…I'm used to intimidating people. I deal almost exclusively with my employees in various parts of the world. Probably the only person I couldn't scare was Roarke, and that amazed me." He paused, studied her and then added, "Well, till now. Seems I can't scare you either."

"I see," Anna-Laura murmured, folding her arms over her chest and regarding him. "And was I merely another person to frighten, so that there would be no more questions, no further trespassing? Lest you forget, I am a princess, and royalty is raised to know no subordination, no inferiority. I won't try to emphasize my royal status, but neither will I allow you to treat me as something you would step on."

Gregory frowned a little and released her. "If you think I'm going to do that on a regular basis, then maybe you _should_ leave. I'm used to being in charge, Anna-Laura…or should I start calling you Your Highness now?" Anna-Laura scowled in return, but he went right on. "I'm a take-charge person, a go-getter, a self-starter. I have no patience with indecisive people—and even less with pushy and rude people. I also don't like people who ask personal questions. Unfortunately, you asked me what I consider a personal question, and it got my temper going." He looked at her for the space of two heartbeats, then said neutrally, "It's up to you. You can stay or go as you choose."

"I thought you wanted me to stay," she said.

"I do," he told her, "but I'll leave you the choice."

She still hesitated. "Don't you fear that I'd ask you another personal question?"

Gregory sighed and said, "I'm trying to apologize, to explain myself, Anna-Laura. I'd like to try to make this up to you as well. But as I said, if you want to leave, then you can leave. I won't force you to stay."

"Just tell me something," Anna-Laura said slowly. "Why do you consider my asking about your plans for Christmas a personal question?"

"That wasn't the personal question. It was the one about why I have no family pictures on the walls," Gregory replied.

"I beg your pardon," Anna-Laura said, again taking refuge in formality. "I retract the question; you need not answer it."

"Don't go all royal on me," Gregory said, far more gently than she had learned to expect from him in the few hours she'd been acquainted with him. "Please. I feel like I have to kowtow at your feet."

Anna-Laura murmured, _"Må sanktarna hålla plass till mej._ Gregory, I can't help being royal. I was born royal." She risked a glance at him and saw him watching her with a pleading look. "Perhaps," she admitted with a tiny smile, "I 'go all royal on you', as you say it, because I find some comfort in it…in reinforcing my station in life so that I feel less intimidated by the other person."

Out of nowhere, he grinned. "Was that a confession?"

"I suppose it was," she said after a moment's surprised reflection. Raising the eyebrow again, she said with a small smile of her own, "Now you owe me one."

Gregory laughed and bowed to her. "Your wish is my command, Anna-Laura. Now if you'll come and sit down again, and consent to dessert, I'll make a confession to you, and I hope you'll still feel charitable about me after you hear it."


	7. Chapter 7

§ § § -- December 23, 2003

"Where's Mother?" asked Roald at the main house. "She was supposed to be having dinner here with us."

"She has a dinner date," said Leslie with a smile, taking her chair after Christian pulled it out for her. "She seems to have met one of our resident multimillionaires, and you'll never guess who it is, Father."

"Oh?" said Roarke, pausing to give her a curious look.

Leslie nodded. "Gregory Nordeman."

"Who's that?" Roald asked with a heavy frown.

"He owns the island's newspaper," Leslie said. "It's my understanding that he also owns other newspapers around the world, but I don't know exactly where. He's known to be reclusive and…well, let's say less than friendly."

"Then what in hell is Mother doing eating dinner with him?" Roald demanded, his eyes widening and his frown somehow deepening. "It makes no sense!"

Christian glanced at his nephew. "Your mother's entitled to eat with whomever she pleases. Apparently it pleased her to eat with this Gregory Nordeman."

"Don't worry about it, Roald," Leslie suggested with a smile. "As far as I'm aware, he isn't wanted for any crimes, including murder. I'm sure your mother'll be glad to tell you more when she comes back." She watched Christian maneuver Lisi's stroller into position against the porch railing, out of Mariki's usual path to the table; they had fed the baby before bringing her to the main house. "She'll be fine right there, my love."

Christian smiled at her and took his own chair. "I was just thinking of Mariki's cart," he said. "I hope there's room enough for both of them. Anyhow…so how have you been occupying your time, Roald?"

Roald shrugged and added some dressing to his bowl of salad. "Mr. Roarke allowed me to accompany him to the island's orphanage," he said.

"Orphanage?" Christian echoed, exchanging an astonished look with Leslie.

"There _is_ one here," Roald said, with a trace of his usual impudence. Christian quirked his mouth to one side but withheld any other reaction, and after a moment the young prince continued with obviously false diffidence, "I've decided to try teaching basic karate to underprivileged children."

"That's a great idea!" Leslie exclaimed.

"That it is," Christian said, very surprised. "Are you planning to return home soon to begin, or what do you have planned?"

"I don't know how long we're going to be here," Roald said, "but I did notice that there are children here who have an interest in the martial arts too—girls as well as boys. I thought I would set up a class here, perhaps in an empty storefront in the village. Mr. Roarke suggested I could advertise in the island newspaper for teachers, especially since I'll have to go home sooner or later. When I'm back, I can start another branch of the project, probably in Sundborg or Dalslund. I'll get some help from Torvald Arenstam."

"The boatbuilder's son?" Christian asked, surprised again, pausing with a forkful of greens. "Do you think he'll be interested?"

"I'll talk him into it," said Roald with confidence. "We've known each other since _primaskolan_. We used to watch all those old martial-arts films together."

"In that case, more power to you," Leslie said and grinned. "That's terrific, Roald. I wish you lots of luck with it. In fact, I'll ask my friends if they think any of their kids might be interested in taking your classes."

"Don't bother," Roald flared up, to her surprise. "I'll spread the word on my own, and I don't need pity charity from you."

Roarke gazed at Roald without expression; Christian looked as if he were about to explode, and Leslie laid a hand on his arm, winking surreptitiously at him. He raised a curious eyebrow at her and sat back to watch; and she turned to the young prince. "I see," she said. "Just because they're my friends' kids, they don't deserve to know about your karate classes, no matter how interested they might be, is that it?" Roald stared at her, and she shrugged. "Fine, I'll give you their phone numbers, and you can call and tell them yourself that you're going to be teaching karate, since you seem so determined to do this all on your own." She took a bite of her supper.

Roarke and Christian glanced at each other, both suppressing smiles and each aware of the action in the other. Roald missed it all, since he was gaping at Leslie. After a full minute the prince cleared his throat. "Which of your friends' children do you think would be interested in martial arts, then?"

Leslie glanced up. "I'm sure my friend Camille's boys would be thrilled—David's thirteen and Craig's six—and my friend Myeko's son Alexander would probably enjoy it too; he's eleven. Myeko's daughter Noelle is almost ten, and so is my friend Maureen's daughter Brianna; they might be interested, and maybe my friend Tabitha's daughter Cristina; she's six, almost seven." She grinned suddenly and observed, "I seem to remember Maureen and Lauren telling me some years back that Katsumi surprised them by demonstrating some basic karate herself. Her Haruko might have an interest too; she's thirteen."

Roald had been staring at her, and now he said in amazement, "That's seven children! Either you have a lot of friends, or they have a lot of kids."

Leslie giggled. "A little of both," she said cheerfully. "I'll give them a call this evening when Christian and I take Lisi home with us."

"No, leave her here," Roald said, peering at his sleeping niece from across the table and surprising Christian and Leslie again. "I'll watch her till Mother comes back."

"All right," Christian agreed and smiled a little. "I wonder how Anna-Laura's getting on with this Nordeman fellow."

"It's my understanding," Roarke observed, "that he can be quite hermitlike and brusque. I believe his employees at the newspaper, even those in the boardroom, are rather intimidated by him."

"Anna-Laura's tough," Christian said, "and she's royalty atop that. She'll easily hold her own in his presence."

‡ ‡ ‡

Gregory and Anna-Laura resumed their seats at the table, and he glanced up at her, offering, "Wine?"

"Half a glass only, thank you," she said. She watched him pour, then directed her steady gaze on him till he looked up finally. He smiled ruefully.

"I see you won't give up or conveniently forget," he remarked, "and I did promise you. All right." Gregory filled his glass while he spoke. "I'm fifty-five years old, to begin with, and I've had days when I think I have nothing to show for it." He put the wine bottle back on the table and picked up the glass, staring into its contents and slowly swirling the liquid. "I was married when I was twenty-five years old, to the heiress of a local furniture dealer with five stores in the St. Cloud, Minnesota, area, where I was born and raised. Her name was Delilah, and she was probably the prettiest girl I'd ever seen. In five years' time we had three children…Dorienne, Jory and Robia. I had a nice high position at the newspaper my father owned, and I was negotiating to buy a rival paper when it started." He cleared his throat, looked away and said painfully, "Someone kidnapped Robia. She was a year old at the time, and no trace was ever found of her. To this day I don't know if she's alive or dead, and I can only hope she's out there somewhere, maybe even aware that she isn't whoever her kidnapper might have told her she is…" He glanced up and then looked away again at Anna-Laura's shocked gaze. "Even the ransom we offered didn't bring her back.

"It skewed Delilah's mind. She began to close herself off, started mourning Robia's absence, and started criticizing Jory and Dorienne for everything on earth. I couldn't do any right either. She insisted I drop my bid for the paper, but I was pretty hardheaded—thought if I got the thing, raised our income, we could offer a bigger ransom for Robia and she might come back home. We fought a lot about it. One night I finally yelled at her that I wanted a divorce…in front of the kids. She looked shocked, but it shut her up.

"In fact, it was the last time I ever saw the three of them. While I was at work the next day, she took the kids out, and…how it happened, I'll never know, but she drove off a bridge. All three of them drowned."

Anna-Laura breathed a silent curse in _jordiska_. His wife and two older children dead, his youngest child gone apparently forever…he'd lost as much as she had. He looked up and said with a trace of bitterness, "But believe it or not, it doesn't end there. I was thirty-two then. I met a woman named Priscilla and we were married, but before the end of the first month I realized she wanted me only for my money. I was making pretty good cash by that time and had a bit of a name for myself. I told her to get out, but she claimed she was pregnant. I didn't believe her till it started to show, and then I asked her if the kid was mine. She carried on like a banshee, weeping and wailing and insisting she'd been faithful, but I just didn't believe it. She didn't take care of herself and the pregnancy like she should've been doing, and she clearly didn't care what happened to the baby. When she gave birth, the baby was stillborn, and that was it for me. I threw her out and made sure she had only the things she'd come into the marriage with. She sued, but by then I could afford good lawyers, and I prevented her from getting anything.

"That's still not the last of it. Some huckster showed up with a little girl in tow and claimed it was Robia. I'd always wondered where she might be, and I'd never retracted the ransom for her. The kid was about the right age and had the right coloring—light like Delilah. Robia would have been about nine. Of course, by then there was some serious money at stake, and the claim was investigated. Took almost six months. You can't imagine how it devastated me when the child was proven not to be Robia and the woman making the claim got exposed as the money-grubbing fraud she was. She was tossed in prison and the child was put into foster care. I offered to take her, but the system didn't work that way. Since then two more claims have come and gone, and each one hurt worse than the last when they turned out to be bogus. So last year I retracted the ransom and just gave up." He looked at Anna-Laura with stark pain on his face. "If Robia's really still out there, she undoubtedly doesn't know or care who she really is, and I learned to face the fact that she never will. Too many years have gone by."

"How old would Robia be now?" asked Anna-Laura a little hesitantly.

"Twenty-six," said Gregory. "Probably married by now, maybe even got a kid or two. That is, if she's still alive."

Anna-Laura considered his tale. It crossed her mind to think that perhaps Roarke could help—but then she thought again. If he'd wanted Roarke's help, he'd already have asked for it, and she dared not suggest it for fear he'd lash out at her. After a bit she asked gently, "Does it give you any comfort to believe she's still alive?"

"Not much. It only reminds me what I've missed—her entire life, pretty much. I just don't think about it. In any case, it hurt too much to think not only about Robia, but about Delilah and Dorienne and Jory too. Dorienne would've been thirty-one now and Jory would be thirty, if they'd survived." He shook his head a little. "I've always missed those kids, all three of them. Dorienne was the most feminine little girl I ever knew…and Jory, my son, he was bright as hell…learned to read before he started kindergarten. I named him for a _jordisk_ ancestor of mine, the great-grandfather who came over in the first place." He sat there visibly fighting back his emotions, and Anna-Laura waited, unsure exactly what to say. In a moment or two Gregory muttered, "I couldn't stand the memories, so I burned every picture in the house. Every one of them, even Robia's. I'd been through so much pain between Jory's and Dorienne's deaths and Robia's kidnapping and the attempts to fool me for money by claiming she'd been found, it was just easier to pretend they'd never existed."

"Words are so inadequate," Anna-Laura said softly. "I'd say I'm sorry, but it hardly seems to cover it. But I appreciate the great effort you went to, the meaning of the gesture of your telling me about your children."

Gregory cleared his throat and drank some wine, then peered at her. "I'd say it's your turn now," he remarked. "I know you've lost family too."

"Well, obviously, my parents are both dead," she said. "Mother died some eighteen years ago of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, and Father passed on ten years later, primarily of Alzheimer's disease, though there were signs of other physical problems. However, my first terrible loss was my husband, Esbjörn Lagnebring. We were married when I was twenty-four and he twenty-seven. Cecilia was born the next year, and Roald two years later.

"Esbjörn had an incredible political career in front of him. I actually first met him at one of our royal Christmas balls, when his father—a prominent local official in his hometown—came to present his family to ours. In 1982 Esbjörn won a resounding victory as the head of our parliament; he was quite popular, really, nearly as much so as my brother Christian." She smiled wistfully. "Christian and Esbjörn had much different interests, so I can't say they really became friends, but they got on well and were always able to talk about the sorts of things men usually talk about. In any case, there was a faction that immediately claimed that Esbjörn had had an unfair advantage in the election because he had married into the royal family. In October, after just a few weeks of serving as head of parliament, he was gunned down in the capital city. There were quite a few witnesses and the assassin was caught almost instantly, but Esbjörn had been mortally wounded. They told me he died within five minutes of being shot."

Gregory cursed aloud, then cleared his throat. "Excuse me…but that was barbaric."

"More than you know. This sort of thing isn't supposed to happen in Scandinavian countries, but of course you'll remember that a little more than three years later, Olof Palme was killed in Stockholm, and there was as much attention called to that as to Esbjörn's death. In any case, I couldn't bear to go anywhere for several months after that, and I had to be pulled out of seclusion. I tried to make certain my children knew something about their father. Ceci was four when he died, and she might have had some hazy memories of him, but Roald was only two and couldn't be expected to remember anything."

"I see," said Gregory with a nod.

"And now Ceci's gone too—she and her husband were killed instantly in a head-on collision only eight days ago." Anna-Laura closed her eyes against the burn of tears. "They left behind a seven-month-old daughter—Elisabeth, or Lisi as we call her. She's the baby you saw me with earlier today. I feel in some ways as though she's all I have left, because my son Roald is pulling farther and farther from me. He's always had a rebellious streak in him, but after he finished school he fell in with some rich young fools with too much time and money on their hands and not enough sense to find constructive ways to use either. I don't know what to do with him any longer. He has no interest in his niece and I don't think he's properly mourned his sister."

Gregory sat back in his chair and nodded. "You always had family to turn to in your grief, though, didn't you?" he said gently. "I never really did. I suppose I could have turned to friends, but I didn't have any of those to speak of."

"Well, yes…my brothers and their wives, of course," Anna-Laura said slowly. "That is, until my brother Arnulf died a year and a half ago. In his case it was a heart attack, probably brought on by a particular and extremely rare spice he used. It's a long story and I won't go into it here. After his death my niece Gabriella was crowned queen, and Arnulf's wife, Kristina, went into such heavy mourning that she never recovered. She's in a care facility, quite disturbed mentally, and her two younger daughters see her fairly regularly, though they say she recognizes no one and seems to be living in the days when my father was on the throne and she and Arnulf were being constantly spotted on the party circuit. I think she's dying, myself—very, very slowly, of course, but I do."

"A damn shame," Gregory said with real sympathy. "So you've lost quite a few people too: your husband, your parents, your brother, your daughter and son-in-law. Maybe…" He paused long enough for Anna-Laura to focus questioningly on him, and then gave her a crooked little grin. "This'll be the corniest-sounding thing you probably ever heard, but maybe you and I were meant to meet. Maybe you were supposed to trespass around my koi pond, and maybe I was supposed to notice you doing it and come out and yell at you."

They both laughed, a little shakily. "Maybe so," Anna-Laura said. "I expect time will tell us if this is destined to be the beginning of a close friendship."

"Or perhaps something more," Gregory offered quietly, and they looked at each other with hesitant, but heartfelt, smiles, before he suggested, "Well, how about dessert?"

§ § § -- December 26, 2003

"Don't argue with me," Christian warned Leslie genially. "I want to find out if there's something responsible for all that sleeping you're doing, or if it's actually natural—at least, natural for you." He grinned at the face she made. "So yes, I'm going back there with you when Dr. Hannaford calls you in for your examination."

"All right, all right, fine," Leslie said and threw her hands into the air. "I suppose if she protests, that stubborn prince I married will make an appearance and throw his royal weight around."

"You know me very well, don't you?" said Christian cheerfully, and she chuckled in resignation, settling into the front seat. He slid into the driver's side, patted her arm and got them on the road to the island's hospital. "You know," he remarked as he gained the Ring Road, "I'm still amazed at the friendship Anna-Laura's developed with Gregory Nordeman. It makes me wonder if there's not some more subtle undercurrent there."

"Could be," Leslie said. "If you ask me, it's the best thing for both of them. It sounded to me as if they had shared quite a bit, that first dinner they had together."

"Do you know anything about him?" Christian asked curiously. "That is, other than his name and the fact that he owns a lot of newspapers?"

"Not really," Leslie said. "The only thing I can recall is a big news story that came out just about the time I came here to live with Father. I don't remember the particulars, but I think it had to do with the kidnapping of one of his children. Since he was alone when he came here and bought his mansion, though, I can only assume that he went through a divorce or something."

"That far back?" Christian mused. "And you said 'children', plural. That suggests that his other children are grown. I'll readily confess to a good deal of curiosity, but I think it's too soon for us to ask questions. Anna-Laura's still grieving over Ceci and Axel, and she and Nordeman have known each other only a few days." He glanced at her with a mischievous twinkle in his hazel eyes. "I think we need to place priority on that baby you're carrying around with you and why the little stinker is constantly putting you to sleep." Leslie burst out laughing and agreed with him.

At the hospital, Dr. Lambert came out and greeted Christian and Leslie. "Dr. Hannaford should be right with you," she said, referring to Leslie's obstetrician-gynecologist, who had recently joined the medical staff. "So how's the baby coming along?"

"It keeps knocking me out," Leslie said with a grin. "Christian likes to make fun of me for falling asleep all the time."

Dr. Lambert laughed. "That's pretty normal, actually. And hey, Leslie, you're starting to actually look pregnant. This is going to be really exciting, once we get through the next six months or so. Oh…hi, Pamela." Dr. Hannaford had come out, and Christian and Leslie both greeted her.

"Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Enstad," the obstetrician replied and smiled, then asked Leslie, "So, how are you feeling?"

"No more nausea," Leslie said, "but I seem to sleep all the time. I thought that wasn't supposed to happen till later in the pregnancy."

Dr. Hannaford told her, "Not necessarily; it's normal enough to feel sleepiness this early on. You shouldn't let it worry you."

"Even if it seems excessive?" broke in Christian. "She fell asleep standing up on our way out of the royal Christmas ball earlier this month, and I began to wonder then."

Dr. Hannaford considered that, then said, "Well, why don't you both come on back, then. Actually, what you thought was falling asleep might have been a fainting spell; that happens occasionally, though less often than the movies would have us think. Let's take a look at you, Mrs. Enstad, and we'll find out how you're progressing."

"I remember fainting only once before," Leslie remarked as she and Christian followed Dr. Hannaford down to an examination room. "But that came out of exhaustion. You can ask Dr. Lambert about that—she'll remember it well. But I just never figured I was prone to fainting. Pregnancy really changes a lot of things, doesn't it?"

"Sure does," Dr. Hannaford said cheerfully, "but most of those changes are normal. You were both right to bring up the sleepiness question—if anything seems way out of line to either of you, you should let me know. Now let's check the usual stuff, and then we'll see what's going on."

Christian stood by and watched avidly while Dr. Hannaford ran Leslie through the usual checkup; then she grinned at them and said, "This should be enjoyable. You're about twelve weeks into the pregnancy, Mrs. Enstad, and since you're over thirty-five, we're watching you a little more carefully. You'll remember the blood test we did on the last appointment for your first-trimester screening. Now we're going to do an ultrasound for the same reason. The primary aim here is to see whether there's any risk of Down syndrome, and this is completely painless. Just lie back on the table here and lift your top so we can see your tummy, and I'll get the gel." She left the room for a moment, and Leslie lay back on the examination table, glancing at Christian.

"You seem fascinated, my love," she teased.

"It _is_ fascinating," Christian said, sounding a bit excited. "And this time we're going to see the baby, aren't we?" He moved to stand by her side, clasping her hand once she had bared her abdomen, and grinned at her. "If it's possible to find out whether it's a boy or a girl this soon, do you want to know now, or wait till you give birth?"

Leslie grinned back and said, "Maybe I'm kind of old-fashioned, but I'd rather not know till I deliver. I just think it's more fun that way. When the addition to the house is finished, we can always paint in neutral colors—though frankly, I don't think it's fair that blue is traditionally restricted to boys. My room at the main house is blue, after all."

"True," said Christian. "We can paint and decorate in any color you like, my Rose, so don't worry about that. But I agree—I'd rather wait and have the fun of telling everyone at the time the baby is born, and finding out ourselves at the same time."

Dr. Hannaford came back in time to hear his last sentence. "Aha. That answers a question I'd have asked in a few minutes anyway. Some folks can't wait, some folks like the suspense. Myself, I couldn't stand it, and I had to know then and there." She chuckled with them, pulling the lid from a container. "This might be cold at first, but it'll warm up quickly." She slathered gel across Leslie's stomach; it was indeed cold, and Leslie flinched at first contact, making all three of them laugh. A few minutes later, Dr. Hannaford was slowly moving the transducer across her stomach, and they were all avidly watching the image on the monitor. At first it was hard to tell even where the fetus was, and both Christian and Leslie squinted in perplexity. But then Dr. Hannaford said, "There's the little devil." And they did indeed see a ghostly, humanesque figure on the screen, with a large head and clearly discernible arms and legs. Christian and Leslie stared in transfixed fascination.

Dr. Hannaford moved the transducer further…and made a surprised sound right alongside Christian's and Leslie's soft gasps when a second little human form was revealed, facing the first one. _"Sjutton sanktar!"_ Christian whispered, using a _jordisk_ expression Leslie had never heard before. She barely noticed, so stunned was she.

"My God, we're having twins!" she breathed. While Christian gaped in astonishment at the image, she turned to Dr. Hannaford. "How can you tell if they're identical or fraternal? My younger sisters were identical twins, so it's kind of important to me."

"I'm sure it is," said Dr. Hannaford with another grin. "Let's get a look here. If they share a placenta, they'll definitely be identical. Separate placentas can mean either one, so if there are two placentas, we won't really know till they're born. Let's see." Leslie turned back to the screen, and when Christian's hand tightened on hers, she squeezed it in reassurance. He still looked blindsided; Leslie was beginning to feel the first glimmerings of wonder in addition to her own shock.

"I can't believe this," Christian murmured. "I don't recall any twins in the family for at least the past two centuries. I could ask Anna-Laura, but…" His voice trailed off and he just stared, wide-eyed.

"Looks like yours are identical," said Dr. Hannaford. "Well, congratulations, both of you." She grinned at them. "All the time you were hoping to get pregnant, and here you've got a bonus. Maybe you should start thinking about what to name them."

About forty-five minutes later they went into the main house together, hands clasped tightly. Leslie had driven, since Christian was still quite overwhelmed. They found Anna-Laura in the study talking with Roarke; both looked up when they entered. Anna-Laura stared at her brother. "Christian, are you all right?"

"He will be," Leslie said. "Father, Anna-Laura, you won't believe this. We just came from my exam. Dr. Hannaford did an ultrasound, and we're going to have twins!"

"Are you indeed!" Roarke exclaimed, sounding genuinely amazed. "Wonderful!"

"It's incredible!" Anna-Laura added, rising from her chair and beaming. "The last twins in the family were born in the mid-sixteenth century, so this is all the more astounding." She hugged Leslie and then Christian, who blinked and stared at her. "For fate's sake, Christian, what's the matter? It's almost too bad Arnulf couldn't have known about this. I can still remember him prancing around when Gabriella was born because he was the first prince to father two daughters in nearly two hundred years. Somehow, Christian, you and Leslie have managed to outdo him. That should make you quite happy."

"Maybe I'll be happy when it's sunk in a little," Christian said. "Becoming a father was low enough a priority to me that I treated the whole concept as an abstract. When it became reality, I spent two weeks dealing with the avalanche of emotions, of every stripe, that came out of the initial diagnosis. I'd finally grown used to looking forward to a baby, and now I find I'll be the father of two. And we're told they're identical, too."

"That's even more fun," Anna-Laura said eagerly, while Roarke chuckled. "In their infancy, you can have the joy of dressing them alike. When I was a little girl I remember hoping I'd have identical twins when I grew up." She hugged Leslie again. "Tell me, how long do you expect it to be before the addition to your house is complete?"

Christian looked at her askance and said, "I may have to ask that the timetable be sped up slightly, but we were given a completion date of late February or early March. At that point Leslie and I are planning to decorate the nursery…or rather, nurseries, perhaps… but we were going to leave the guest suite till some later date. Why?"

Anna-Laura glanced between him and Roarke. "It was my hope to stay for at least two or three months," she explained. "I'll be keeping Lisi with me, although Roald plans to return to Lilla Jordsö in mid-January, or as soon as he's found a good martial-arts instructor to take over those classes he's begun teaching, whichever is later. If you're willing to spend some effort on the guest suite, I could remain here longer with Lisi—perhaps long enough to be able to help you after the babies are born. You'll need extra assistance, especially in the first several weeks."

Leslie looked at Christian, who smiled. "I have no real objections," he said and shot his sister a sly glance, "especially since it seems Anna-Laura may have other ulterior motives, such as giving her potential romance a chance to develop." Anna-Laura scowled at him, and he laughed. "But of course, your opinion counts too, my darling."

"I think it would be great," she said softly. "My mother can't be here, after all, and my friends are a little at a remove anyway, with their own kids. Plus, Lauren and Maureen are both pregnant too, so they've got their own babies to worry about. But this would be a godsend, and I think you're really brave and generous to offer when you have Lisi to take care of too. I'd love it, Anna-Laura, thank you so much."

"We'll get Anna-Kristina to help as well. She and Mateo are still waiting to hear about the baby they're trying to adopt, so if it stretches out that long, she may welcome the chance for some hands-on learning," Christian said. "That truly is very generous, Anna-Laura, and we both appreciate it. This way, Mr. Roarke, you need only be the grandfather."

Roarke laughed. "You're likely to have more offers of help than you think you will. In any case, I expect this is going to be quite the revelation, both here and in Lilla Jordsö."

"So it will," Anna-Laura agreed. "I hope my extended stay won't inconvenience you, Mr. Roarke."

"Not at all, Your Highness. The bungalow is yours for as long as you need it. Leslie, have you received any restrictions yet on the time you're allowed to work?"

"No," Leslie told him, "Dr. Hannaford said if I can stay awake, I should work as long as I feel up to it. Just the usual precautions, that's all. Wow, I think when I tell the girls, they're going to kill me. They'll say I'm trying to outdo all the rest of them by having twins."

"I think they're more likely to feel sorry for you," Christian kidded her, "although I daresay now you'll probably scare Lauren into demanding to know if she too is carrying twins. Brian would go into orbit. For that matter," he added with a little sigh, "I think I myself am in orbit. You'd better give me some time before I make this announcement on the royal website."

"We have loads of time for that," Leslie promised him, squeezing his hand and then gazing down at her abdomen, flattening one hand over it as the others watched. "I just wish Mom could know about this."

"As I wish Mother could," Christian agreed softly, putting one hand over hers.

"They do," said Roarke gently, and when they all turned to look at him, he merely smiled and relaxed in his chair.

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_My apologies that this story took so long to complete, but now that it (and Christian's biography) are done, things will move along a little faster, I promise that! Thanks to everyone for your patience._

_Next: Christian gets a chance to visit Lilla Jordsô's past again. But he's in for a very rude surprise…_


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